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utilitycaster · 20 days

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Hi! I saw your tags on the escape room poll that Team Liam would be last and I wanted to ask why? While I agree that they wouldn’t be first, I wouldn’t put them last either. Do you think they would just have too much conflict to use their skills?

I didn't realize this was from last night's 4SD and because OP said "Battle Royale" I assumed that it was in some way a combat-oriented escape room, in which the lack of a dedicated/significant healer (Vax has, what, 30 lay on hands and a couple low level spell slots) and the fact that Orym is one decent but not incredible tank among two of the most tissue-paper characters in terms of HP would spell their defeat.

With the understanding that this is a traditional escape room here's my thought process:

From my escape room experience there are four skills that map easily into D&D skills and one that does not map into the D&D character skill chart but does map extremely well onto players. They are:

Investigation/raw intelligence. How good are you at inspecting and comprehending things?

Sleight of Hand/raw dexterity. How good are you at manipulating objects/fine motor control?

Persuasion or Intimidation/raw charisma. How good are you at convincing people to work together or perform tasks?

Perception. How good are you at generally noticing things right away?

The most crucial thing, however, is "do you try dumb shit and push buttons and try to figure out everything quickly." And so:

Toss up between Travis and Sam's character teams in terms of the D&D skills; Chetney and Veth are both particularly suited for escape rooms between strong intelligence and high dexterity. I think Sam's team overall is probably stronger; Tary's mechanical knowledge and FCG's desire for everyone to work together and Scanlan's general buffing abilities/capacity to get people to do what he wants (presumably win) mean everyone has a lot to bring to the table. FCG is the only one with decent perception, iirc, though, and Travis as a player is fundamentally a button pusher and therefore his characters will inherit this energy even though Chetney and Fjord are going to be carrying the entire thing (although, actually, Grog will probably respond well to being asked to perform tasks or look for things).

Taliesin's characters have the combined skills but unfortunately with the except of Caduceus they all have the trait "does not work well with others" and Ashton and Percy in particular wouldn't listen to Caduceus and they're the ones with the most relevant skills here. Beau could do an escape room on her own and probably would (note: someone told me this is what Marisha said on 4SD and I agree wholeheartedly) but necessarily will be less effective than groups who work together. Vex would do pretty well and would be competitive enough, but none of Laura's characters are particularly expert in investigation and if Vex and Imogen clash it is 100% over in terms of getting out in time, though I think Jester would make a valiant go of it. None of Ashley's characters crack +1 in investigation and no one has 20 dex, and I doubt most would be interested or competitive about this, though I do think they'd get along the best by far.

Rounding things out, I suspect that Liam's characters are just behind Taliesin's in terms of conflict; it won't be quite as heated but I get the sense all three of them, all of whom are very much about working together with their respective parties, will not be very good at working together with each other, and Orym is the least likely to take the lead despite most suited for it. Caleb is extremely smart but I don't think he'd be the most invested in going super fast. I don't think they'll be last - Ashley or Taliesin are more likely - but they'd certainly not be first. The NPCs, meanwhile, have the advantage of two people who know each other well, a very agreeable and mature person in Eshteross, and Essek and Allura will probably vibe solely on the basis of being wizards who know and like Caleb if they don't know each other personally yet. Iirc Essek and Eshteross should have decent dex scores though not 20, and everyone has diplomatic skills. I believe Allura's wisdom is respectable as well. They'll certainly be the most well-behaved and adult about it.

In conclusion, you're right, probably not last (would almost certainly be last in the combat scenario I mistakenly imagined) but absolutely should not be first.

#answered #promisetourself #cr tag

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demigoddessqueens · 2 years

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tea 🍵 and sugar 💋 💕

Just a little multi-fandom headcanon combo from some of my favorites.

lemon tea - what are mornings like with them?

Mornings with Alucard are an intimate setting, with a hearty homemade breakfast for you and a sweet morning kiss as well

peppermint tea - what do they get excited about?

Ezio Auditore de Firenze finds the excitement in many things in life, but a new place to meet secretly 😉 with you always gets his heart racing

chamomile tea - what is their sleep schedule like? does it change around their s/o?

Sleep does not exist for Bruce Wayne/The Batman as he goes out at crazy late hours to patrol Gotham, but if he does meet you, good luck trying to get him into bed. And staying for a good night’s rest (and cuddles)

earl grey tea - how did they court their s/o?

Who would thought fighting monsters would be the easiest way to woo you? At least that’s what Trevor Belmont thought when you still looked at him lovingly, even scuffed up

milk tea - what are their kisses like?

Xander’s kisses start off tentative, but as he grows more comfortable with you, it’s pouring every living feeling he has

coffee - do they get jealous easily? how do they show it?

Jacob Frye, Vax’ildan, and Dimitri were not raised to be jealous men but that still won’t stop them from side eyeing someone, or pulling you close, if a stranger gets too chummy

rosehip tea - how romantic are they? how do they show affection?

Jester has picked up more than her fair share of tips from the romance novels she adores

black tea - what do they look for in a person?

Hector and Isaac seek a kindred soul that just accepts them, a hand reaching out to them in companionship 💕

pomegranate tea - at what point did they know they loved their s/o?

You would occasionally go out on patrols with Ms. Selina Kyle, and the one time you take a hit for her is when she realizes that you’ve always made sure to put her first

matcha tea - how and when do they propose to their s/o?

Fjord and you were help fighting off a rogue pirate band, and you both knew your feelings and just ran with it. Cue to the rest of the Nein honorarily marrying you both on the high seas

Inspired by Pirates of the Caribbean

chai tea - how do they spice up their relationship?

Given that Claude has a knack for keeping his cards close to him, I could easily seeing him getting into role playing

hibiscus tea - what’s their favourite place to take their s/o?

Percy likes to walk arm in arm with you in Whitestone’s garden

green tea - how do they comfort their s/o?

Dorian likes to hold you close, and let you ramble on if something’s on your mind.

russian caravan tea - how experienced are they with relationships?

Hubert was always dedicated to his work and never set much time aside for himself, so it would be rare of him to have had a past relationship

I was today years old when I realized Hubert and Dorian are the same VA 😆

english breakfast tea - would they want a family?

Sypha and Arno Victor Dorian would appreciate (and adore) the idea of creating a family of their own, to have a small one that bears their likeness

rooibos tea; what’s their favourite thing to do with their s/o?

When there’s some downtime, Greta appreciates picking flowers and enjoying a small nature stroll or a nap.

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stardustedknuckles · 2 years

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Taking thoughts about the role of Matt's kindness in Critical Role to the next level, I find myself thinking about how one of the most powerful aspects of this entire story was the good faith that drove it. By which I mean: I hear people say that campaign 1 was more plot/bigger stakes - and technically they're right, but the stakes in campaign 2 and the stories being told reverberated on a personal level in a way that spits in the face of the more conventional message we get from so many stories these days along the lines of "well that's just how it is." Those are the stories that had us bracing for Jester to be let down by her mom and her dad, expecting nobody to follow up on Beau being kidnapped, waiting for Yeza to crack under the strain of Veth leaving so often. In the jaded mainstream we're used to, Vandran would've been callous and dismissive when they finally found him and Fjord would have realized he'd outgrown the sort of approval he was never going to get. Astrid and Eadwulf would have just been using Caleb, too broken to escape the cycle. Cynicism would've been so easily hidden under the guise of realism and hardly questioned. Even applauded. Let me emphasize: it still would have been a great story.

None of that happened. Instead, incredibly, Matt took every chance to love his friends through the very narrative itself in a more explicit way, one that wouldn't have matched the priorities of the first campaign but which shaped the second into something so extraordinary. The world we live in has been darkening in so many ways and there's something bright and healing about watching Matt craft a whole world around uplifting his friends' creations - validating them, avenging them, righting the sorts of tiny, personal wrongs we're so often powerless in our own day-to-day lives to affect. I think that's at the crux of what makes the Mighty Nein so personal to us all. It truly is the little things, and seeing personal struggles given as much weight and resolution as epics about kingdoms and dragons struck a chord the likes of which I'm not sure I'll ever see again.

The narrative conflicts of this story were so much more realistic than the first. But it made all the difference in the world that it was a realism presented through the eyes of people who believe in hope and light. And none more than the DM himself.

#Critical role #There #I think that's everything important I've ever connected to in this show #It's good faith storytelling #Communal and collaborative #And I think that's why I got so mad at people used to cynicism taking every opportunity to shit on complex characters #The hatred for Astrid and Eadwulf was nuts #The fact that people only wanted essek to change so he could be with caleb was frustrating too #But I understand nobody really had a reason to expect anything nice #I'm unfortunately a little naive #I take that light at face value and I assumed the whole while everything would be okay #Because that was the story being told #And I was absolutely right but everyone else was right not to expect it #Odd to be able to make those connections at the end of it all #Watching it over again #CR c2 #Pinning this because I accidentally put into words something about c2 I've been chewing on for more than a year

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chaos-burst · 4 years

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questions and answers

He had meant to be rude. And it had not worked even a little bit. Eodwulf is sure that anyone else would have been offended. Hell, he’s even sure that the other members of this weird group were absolutely offended on behalf of their friend. But Eodwulf can’t say he has ever met a person like this.

There was no malice, no ill intent, no anger.

When you work with Trent you have to be aware of every little shift in the mood. The slightest twitch of an eyebrow can mean the weather is about to turn foul. Eodwulf knows what to look out for. It had been his intent to rev this weirdo up and it had backfired spectacularly.

Damn.

No meat. No booze. And balls of steel, apparently. Eodwulf had never seen anyone talk to Trent like that. And while Bren‘s—Caleb‘s—words of wanting to kill Trent outright had been more than Eodwulf would ever admit to his mentor, it somehow felt less crazily reckless than to call Trent Ikithon, Archmage of Civil Influence for the Cerberus Assembly and one of the most powerful mages in the Empire, a fucking fool.

To his face. With a smile. In a complete sincere manner.

Eodwulf doesn’t want to replay the words in his head over and over again but his dumb brain has latched onto them and he can’t stop. Only this time it’s not one of Trent’s lessons that forces him to obsessively repeat something until you have internalized it to the point where you can cite it in your sleep.

No.

“Pain doesn’t make people. It’s love that makes people.“

Eodwulf has it on repeat in his head the whole way back to the tower and it is still going when he lies down hours later to sleep.

“What are you“ had not been meant as a serious question when Eodwulf had asked it. But by the time he finally falls asleep he feels like it has become a very vital question indeed, because who or what would dare to speak to Master Trent Ikithon in a way like this with an honest smile on their face.

Because for some reason his thoughts have decided to betray him, Eodwulf’s brain makes his tongue and lips form the words again when they see the Mighty Nein the next time. This time, Astrid and Eodwulf have been invited to dinner—Trent has very specifically not been invited, you could say he was uninvited with quite a few flowery words in a strange accent.

And as soon as Eodwulf sees Caduceus he remembers the weirdly polite scratching of a chair, the wide smile that indicates that this is a person Eodwulf possibly can not force to lose their composure through careful placed rudeness. And his mouth betrays him.

“So. What are you, really?“

Caduceus blinks mildly surprised before his unfamiliar features shift into a warm smile that has Eodwulf feel quite a lot of inappropriate things he didn’t expect to find in a place like this.

“Gardener. Maker of fine tea. A decent cook. Keeper of graves“, Caduceus lists of and he uses his long fingers to count the things that are important to him about himself.

“Very powerful cleric“, Jester chimes in from the right. She has Astrid next to her in a chair and Eodwulf is pretty sure that Jester has started to put flowers in Astrid’s hair. But surely he must be mistaken. Who in the Nine Hells are these crazy people?

“Oh, yeah. Well, that too, I suppose“, Caduceus says, his smile still warm like honeyed wine.

“Huh“, Eodwulf says because he can’t for the life of him think of something else to say. But Caduceus is yet again pulling out a chair for him so Eodwulf straightens his shoulders and sits down next to Caduceus. Across the table from him the angry one throws herself into a chair and stares at him.

There’s no fear there either, but she can be easily angered, something Eodwulf is good at. He gives her a canine smile and she holds up her middle finger.

This group is full of people with an enormous lack of self preservation.

And they are so loud.

Eodwulf almost doesn’t hear it when Caduceus turns to him to ask him a question.

“Huh?“, he says again, like a fool.

“And what are you, was what I wanted to know“, Caduceus says, his lazy grin open and honest. There is no malice in his words. He actually wants to know.

Eodwulf thinks “Murderer, wizard, protégé, spy“ but he doesn’t say any of these things. “Maker of graves“ comes to mind, but it seems like too dark of a joke to make.

“Enthusiastic about both meat and booze“, he says in the end and Caduceus laughs.

“Yeah, as are most of my friends.“

The implication these words bring is probably only in Eodwulf’s mind but it makes him swallow and look away to find Astrid’s eyes. But Astrid now has pink flowers in her hair and a look of absolute confusion on her face as Jester rattles of compliment after compliment about various of Astrid’s features.

Eodwulf can’t help but look at Bre—Caleb. And he sees that there is a soft, barely noticeable smile on his old friend’s face as he watches the scene unfold.

What am I, indeed, he thinks.

Trent’s orders have been clear. Get close to the group called the Mighty Nein to find out what they are working on with Lady Vess DeRogna.

Eodwulf allows himself to think that Caduceus might have been right. Maybe Master Ikithon is indeed a fool.

Because being in the presence of these people is like nothing Eodwulf has ever experienced and it makes him think, wonder, question—

“Here we are again“, Caduceus says after, yet again, Astrid and Eodwulf have been invited for dinner. Eodwulf wonders if this group just wants to make it very easy to spy on them, or if they have an agenda of their own—but it’s hard to believe that there might be any coherent agenda behind anything these people do.

He has watched the buff one called Yasha try and play what looked like a harp made of bone and when the angry one, Beau, told her that she looked hot playing the harp Yasha had torn two of the strings which had led to a whole scene of apologies and various tries to fix the harp.

Jester has drawn dicks on pretty much every surface this magical mansion has and she delights in the fact that Caleb brings the dicks to life in various colors. At some point he made glowing sparkles shoot out of one of the dicks Jester had drawn and Jester had laughed as if this was the best joke she had ever witnessed.

Eodwulf notices Astrid’s eyes on Jester.

Eodwulf also notices that while there seems to be no agenda or efficiency behind anything, they are still being watched.

Beau and Fjord look at them. And Eodwulf is pretty sure Caduceus watches everything as well, but he does it without crossing his arms and glaring so much.

“Looks like it”, he answers. Caduceus offers him tea and Eodwulf’s first instinct is to decline, but then he remembers that “maker of fine tea” had been very high on the list of descriptors so he takes the cup he is offered while somewhere in the background people start screaming something that sounds like “FLUFFERNUTTER”.

Eodwulf tries the tea. He’s not a fan of tea, but this tea is absolutely delicious and he finds himself impressed.

“I believe this one comes from the Hollburns’ graves. Those remains made the tea grow quite fast, it was impressive.”

Eodwulf blinks at his tea and then at Caduceus. For a second his brain wonders if this statement should register as a threat, but it had been delivered with such honest delight and a sense of pride that Eodwulf discards that feeling.

“What?”, he asks. Caduceus points at the tea.

“Oh, well, my family grows tea on those graves we’re keeping. In case you wanted to ask me again what I am. Or—hm, I think I already mentioned that I am a keeper of graves?”

Caduceus trails off and looks thoughtful and Eodwulf stares at him.

“Keeper of Graves. That make you a follower of the Matron?”, he asks.

Caduceus looks at him and smiles.

“Not quite. My family serves Melora. But we are descended from a champion of the Raven Queen.”

Eodwulf can’t help but wonder if this was some kind of weird joke. But his goddess usually isn’t one for joking.

Eodwulf considers for a second, then he pulls out the raven feather pendant from under his cloak.

Caduceus nods. “So”, he says and smiles widely. “What are you?”

Eodwulf snorts.

“For real?”, he says.

Caduceus’ smile widens.

“For real.”

It feels like this has become a sort of game.

“What are you?”

“Moral compass. Middle sibling. Eccentric. Amateur flute player.”

Eodwulf finds that through this question he himself posed the first time, he’s been forced to think more about himself than he feels comfortable with.

“What are you?”

“Decent chess player. Dog person. Sportsman. Only child.”, are the things he says out loud.

“Self-made orphan. Patriot. Volstrucker. Torturer.”, are the things he thinks to himself.

Eodwulf has the impression that Caduceus is somehow aware of the things he doesn’t say.

“So. This is the crew you’re running with now?”, Eodwulf asks Bre—Caleb one night before the Mighty Nein will leave with Vess DeRogna to who-knows-where. Neither Astrid nor Eodwulf did get very far with their planned infiltration work. Eodwulf is not even sure how hard they even tried.

It’s very easy to get swept away by the chaos and the weirdness and the complete lack of fear that the group displays when it comes to him and Astrid. They are dangerous people in a lot of ways.

The Mighty Nein are also dangerous people in a very different way. A way that Eodwulf doesn’t know anything about.

“This is my family, ja.”

He says it, just like that, without looking at Eodwulf.

Family.

The word tastes bitter in Eodwulf’s mouth as he leans back in his chair and crosses his arms.

“Weird people”, he says. Caleb huffs.

“You can say that, yes. But they grow on you very quickly”, he answers quietly and with a small, fond smile that makes something inside Eodwulf ache. For a long time Eodwulf pitied Bren for breaking, for not making it, for failing, for being locked away and discarded. Now he realizes that maybe, in a very macabre sort of way, Bren becoming Caleb through failure was the better end of the bargain.

It feels blasphemous to think that.

“The pink one is especially weird”, Eodwulf finds himself saying and he takes a big swig of whiskey from his flask before handing it to Caleb.

“Ja, I noticed that you seem to have a... uh... particular kind of interest in him. And, if I may add, he in you.”

Eodwulf takes the flask back after Caleb drinks. He contemplates the different sorts of feelings inside his gut as the words sink in. Then he tucks it all away very carefully, just as he learned through many years of being in Trent’s presence.

“Still don’t know what he is”, Eodwulf says. Caleb snorts and shakes his head.

“His people are called Firbolg”, he provides.

“Not sure that’s what I mean. Not anymore, at least.”

It seems dangerous to admit that. Caleb turns his head and looks at Eodwulf with a shimmer in his eyes that Eodwulf can’t read. Many years ago he was able to read Bren like an open book, but Caleb is another book entirely.

“You deserve to have some nice things, you know. You deserve friends. A chance of—hm. A chance of peace. A chance for redemption, if you want it.”

Eodwulf gets up and tugs away his flask.

“Pain doesn’t make people. It’s love that makes people. Pain is inconsequential, it’s love that saves them.”

Eodwulf understands the truth in these words now. Bren was broken, Caleb is being healed. Eodwulf doesn’t think that there’s anything left in him that can be saved. Or should be saved.

“Good luck on your journey tomorrow. Don’t die”, Eodwulf says and he leaves Caleb behind.

What are you, he thinks. A sentimental fool.

Astrid sits next to him on one of the balconies of her house and looks up at the stars above them. The Mighty Nein have been gone for six days and it has been very quiet.

They sit in silence and share a bottle of whiskey, passing it back and forth instead of words. It’s been like this for many many years that they’ve allowed themselves to just be. Today though, Astrid breaks the silence.

“I’m going to be the one who kills him.”

She says it quietly, without remorse, without indicating that this is a scandalous statement. She says it just how other people would say “I’ll go to bed soon.”.

Eodwulf stops breathing for just a moment. Then he inhales the cool night air and turns his head to look at her.

“Could kill you for treason”, he says. She looks at him and cocks her head slightly, the analyzing gaze of a murderous spy meets its equal in silence.

“I’d love to see you try”, she says. Eodwulf grins. It feels reckless.

“Don’t die”, he says, the same thing he’s said to Caleb before. Astrid regards him for a long moment and Eodwulf takes another sip. “Will you help me or try to stop me?”

Eodwulf considers this for a moment. Would he try to stop Astrid should she try to kill Trent? No. Would he help her? He doesn’t know that either.

“Can’t you just wait for Bren to do it for you?”

“I won’t lose to him again.”

Eodwulf snorts.

Always so competitive.

“That’s some fucked up shit, Astrid.”

“Shut up, Arschloch.”

Eodwulf grins before getting up to stretch. He puts his hands on the railing of Astrid’s balcony and wonders what Caleb’s new family is up to.

Making a new family never came to mind before. It sounds like something out of a fairy tale. While he contemplates the question whether he would help Astrid kill Trent Ikithon, a slow, familiar voice pops up in his head.

“Hey. Uh—Jester told me to send you an update. We’re still alive. Hope you’re good. Got a new question for you. What will you become?”

The rustling of Astrid’s clothes as she stands up as well somehow tells him that she received a message in her head as well. She steps beside him and puts her hands on the railing next to his.

“They’re persistent”, she says quietly.

Eodwulf nods and inhales.

He doesn’t know what he will become. He didn’t even know that was a question to be asked. The path is clear. It always was.

Pain doesn’t make people.

“Not going to answer?”, she wants to know.

“Don’t have an answer yet.”

It’s unclear to him whether she means her own question or the message Caduceus just sent him.

He answers the sending spell with a simple “I don’t know.”. It takes a few minutes before another message comes in.

“That’s good. Uncertainty is good. It’s the first step in a better direction. I’m going to kill a dragon now. Wish me luck. Good night.”

“I’ll keep you posted on the answer to that question of yours. I’ll see you tomorrow”, he says and leaves Astrid behind on the balcony. Eodwulf thinks about something he hasn’t thought about in a very long time. A priestess in his Matron’s temple once told him: “Death is the only certainty in life.”.

He thinks that Caduceus would agree.

And Eodwulf hopes that the next time he sees that weird, reckless man, he’ll have an answer for him.

#cadwulf #blumengrove #caduceus clay #critfic #critical role #eodwulf #cr spoilers #fanfiction #caduceus #text #screeching into the void #this got a bit out of hand #but i just wanted to get some stuff out of my system

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vexing-imogen · 3 years

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Okay, so, My Thoughts on the party split at the end of 128 and why I think it was Actually Good and Makes Sense Tactically:

Let’s start with the (very tiny) elephant in the room: Luc. While everyone seems a little confused on how old he’s supposed to be, the general consensus is 3-5 years old. Even putting aside the fact that Veth died in the HFB, and that’s likely fueling her desire for her family to Not Go In There, the HFB is a dangerous place to send a young child. Sure, you can tell a 3-5 year old child not to touch anything, but a kid as curious as Luc? And being played by Matthew Mercer, who lives for The Drama? That kid is touching something he’s not supposed to.

Moving on to the logic of who went into the HFB. Caleb can’t go in, since he needs to read the plane shift spell. Veth won’t go in, bc she won’t send her family in (again, likely bc she died the last time she was in there), and she won’t be separated from her family. At least one of the clerics needs to not go in so they can get a long rest and plane shift everyone home. And if those inside the HFB move fast enough, they could potentially pop out while the others are still in this other plane, which would mean both Caduceus and Jester would need a long rest so they could both cast the spell. Marion doesn’t go in because, like Veth, Jester wants to keep her close. She’s also on the verge of a nervous breakdown, and having her with Caduceus, who can cast calm emotions, and Jester, who is her ultimate comfort, is a good thing.

So, that leaves Beau, Fjord, and Yasha as our options for going inside the HFB. Someone has to go in because they have too many people for a single plane shift spell. Beau feels like a given. She’s the fastest of the entire party, and the smartest of the remaining three, and not easily distracted. She can speedrun this bitch. Fjord is also a given, since they need a magic user to activate their way out in the dragon room, but he’s not so obviously a magic user that the ball will attack him just for existing. Yasha didn’t need to go in, but I don’t think it’s a bad thing that she did. She can provide extra protection if they do get attacked, she’s as fast as Beau so she won’t slow them down, and this way she isn’t distracted, worrying about Beau.

As far as we know, the time dilation in the HFB is 1:24. One hour inside equals 24 hours out. If the Happy Fun Trio can truly speedrun this bish and get out in twenty minutes or less, they’ll pop out into whichever plane the others just shifted to. Hence the possible need for both clerics to get their long rest (which they can’t take inside the ball bc that’s a loss of 8 days). They seem to think they’ll drop in either in the study, or very close to it (likely why Matt had Liam roll an intelligence check while opening up the ball. to see if he could recreate the sequence that dropped them close to the study), but even if they don’t, they took the map in with them.

The main unknown here is exactly where the plane shift crew are going to end up. Speculation is either the Nine Hells or the Elemental Plane of Fire, because the tuning fork got unbearably hot while activating. Neither are fantastic options, but Matt is not a cruel DM. He gave them an escape route and, dangerous as it may be, it won’t be an instant death trap.

#critical role #critical role spoilers #cr spoilers #critical role meta #the mighty nein

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chockfullofsecrets · 3 years

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Critical Role: The Opposite of Cuddling

(Read on AO3)

Rating: Gen

Summary: And maybe it wouldn’t be too bad, but - “That’s not gonna work,” he says, feeling a little bad as her face falls. “I’m way too ticklish for that.”

Jester’s expression rebounds at lightning speed. “Caduceus! You’re ticklish?”

“Oh. Yeah,” he grins.

Dome cuddles don't quite work out, but the Mighty Nein make do.

Wordcount: 1.8k (it would be short if it wasn’t supposed to be a snippet fic aaa)

A/N: maybe i am just in the mood for cuddly gang tickles. maybe so.

---

“So,” Jester is proselytizing, brandishing a diagram from her sketchbook into dubious faces, “if we cuddle up around Caduceus just like this it’s going to be super soft and comfy and warm until we get out of this stupid weather! Any questions?”

Caduceus puts his teacup aside and leans down to peer at the sketch. It’s really good, especially the faces. She must have drawn it while watching them sleep last night.

And maybe it wouldn’t be too bad, but - “That’s not gonna work,” he says, feeling a little bad as her face falls. “I’m way too ticklish for that.”

Jester’s expression rebounds at lightning speed. “Caduceus! You’re ticklish?”

“Oh. Yeah,” he grins. It feels good to see her happy, tail flicking as she clutches her sketchbook in clear delight - after two days of nonstop freezing rain, even her forceful cheer has been wavering. “It’s nice, sometimes, but not when we’re, you know. Sleeping.”

“So I could tickle you right now and you wouldn’t be, like, really mad at me?” Jester presses. She’s scooting towards him as she asks, practically trembling with excitement. It’s awfully cute.

Well, it’s been a while, but he can’t say he’s not a little eager for the contact. He ignores the looks from the rest of their group and flops back onto his bedroll, wriggling a little to get comfortable. “Yeah, that’d be good.”

“Um,” Beau says from somewhere behind him, a little strangled. Oh, right.

“We’re not keeping people awake, are we?” he asks, craning his neck to the various edges of the dome people have settled in. “Anyone set on sleeping right now?”

Beau makes a face. "That's not the weird part, Duceus."

“They can help!” Jester chirps, and then she’s cuddled into his side and wiggling tiny tiefling claws above his belly. “Oh, Ca-du-ceus!”

She’s pitching her voice as deep and scary as it can go. It’s not very far. “Yeah?”

“Where’s your very worst tickle spot?”

He laughs. “Telling you that feels like a bad idea.”

“Then I’ll just have to fi-ind it!” She tugs his shirt up with one quick move, and he barely has time to feel the cold before she’s latching onto his sides and burying her entire face into the downy fur on his belly. “Ooh, you’re so soft and warm! I want to cuddle you forever, Caduceus.”

It tickles, but just a little - honestly, he’s more amused by her. “Can’t say I’ve heard that before,” he chuckles, reaching out to poke gently at her side. “You’re not bad yourself.”

She squeaks, pulling her head up just enough to gasp at him. “Oh my gosh, Caduceus, did you just tickle me back? Guys, you have to come help me!”

“Nah, I’m good,” Beau snorts.

Jester lets out a massive sigh and flops back down onto him, and for a pleasant minute or two it’s just her nuzzling into him as he watches raindrops pelt off the amber dome overhead.

Then there’s a rustle, and some clinking, and before he can do anything more than lazily twitch one of his ears in the direction of the sound Yasha’s upside-down face pushes into his field of view.

“Do you mind if I join?” she asks in her quiet way. “I don’t want to overwhelm you.”

Jester springs upright, grabbing happily for her hands. “Yes! Join us!”

Caduceus echoes her, snorting out a quiet laugh as Jester regains some of her energy and starts to scribble her way up his sides. He doesn't have any quiet siblings - Yasha reminds him a little more of the mourners, so it’s always nice to see her reach out. He's good at appreciating that sort of thing.

Yasha smiles shyly down at the both of them as she pulls his head into her lap and starts to play with his ears. “These are so soft,” she marvels. “Are you ticklish here?”

His ears have always been one of his siblings’ favorite spots to tease him with, and apparently they haven’t gotten any less sensitive in the last ten years. “Yeah,” he gasps. “Heh - just - hehe - a little bit.”

There's a frustrated groan off to his right. “Okay, I’ll bite.” Footsteps track around to his side, fleet and quiet, and he waits patiently for a flash of blue cloth to cross his gaze. “But only ‘cause ears are a fucking weird spot and I want to see if this works on you.”

Beau crouches by his side and curls her fingers loosely. “I’m gonna punch you,” she warns. “Probably not that hard, but don’t tense up.”

He nods as best as he can while tilting his head to better let Yasha worry her fingernails at the backs of his ears - he’s not sure if he could feel more boneless if he tried, right now.

The heel of her fist strikes him right in the middle of his chest, fingers clutching around something intangible - that something scurries its way down every nerve he has, and he coughs out a startled laugh before he can help himself. “What was that?”

“Payback for growing lichen on me back at your house,” she quips, but her eyes are narrowed in clear concentration. “Okay, ears, ears… wrists? And knees? And - fuck, man, your entire back? Really? Jes, let’s flip him over, this is going to be good.”

Well, that’s unexpected.

“Wait - ha!” Caduceus yelps, squirming as fingers start to pry their way underneath him. “Hold on now-”

He’s bigger than both of them by far, but they’re strong and not above tickling the backs of his ribs until he starts to squeal. "You're so thin, Caduceus!" Jester exclaims, hooking a finger into the tender gap between two bones and wriggling it mercilessly - his back arches entirely without his permission, letting Beau pry him another inch off the ground, and he whines defensively. "We have to feed you more!"

They get as far as rolling him onto his side before Beau loses patience and starts prodding smugly at his spine. “Your ki is pretty shivery around here, Duceus,” she teases. “Trying to hide your worst spots, huh? Bet you thought we weren’t gonna take this seriously.”

Caduceus is too busy laughing to deal with - any of that, really, especially when Jester slings herself over him so she can reach his back too. “I’m - ahaha! aaa! - oh, that tickles!”

As if in direct response to his babbling, a small weight bundles into the back of his knees. He curls up reflexively with a strangled shout - it’s Nott, cuddling up to him with a shivery sigh as an invisible hand starts to pinch at his kneecaps. “You’re right,” she crows to Jester. “He is soft.”

It does feel nice, being buried under this many people and tickled till the marrow of every bone in his body shivers, happy and helpless, and when Fjord finally sits in front of him and presses a questioning hand to his shoulder Caduceus doesn’t resist the impulse to clutch his hands and pull him in closer.

Fjord comes easily, huffing in quiet amusement as Caduceus buries his face in him and Yasha and wriggles like a freshly surfaced earthworm. “You alright there?” he drawls. “You sound like they’re trying to kill you.”

Nott snorts from somewhere near his belly. “We should stop, then, we’ve only got the one cleric.”

“Hey!”

Everything abruptly derails as Jester launches herself towards Nott and, from the sound of it, kicks Beau right in the face - there’s wheezing, and then shouting, and then the telltale sugar-sweet scent of Jester’s healing magic.

Caduceus holds very still. "Is everyone okay?"

"Yeah," Beau confirms, mangled. He can practically picture Jester frantically squishing her cheeks around as she checks for damage.

A typical tickle fight, as far as the Clays are concerned, just with a different smell - the Wildmother's healing tends more earthy. Even though they’ve stopped tickling, Caduceus can’t help but laugh.

He’s not sure if he imagines Fjord fluttering light fingers along the insides of his wrists as he catches his breath, but by the time he wheezes out one last fit of giggles and rolls himself back over everyone seems to be keeping a respectful distance, if a good deal closer together than they were at the beginning of the evening. “I think that went pretty well,” he says, pleased.

“...so you’re stupid ticklish,” Beau says dryly, scrubbing a bit of dried blood from her lip. “No cuddling Duceus while he’s trying to be unconscious, message received.”

There’s a chorus of agreement from all but one - Caduceus looks around and spots their final member for the first time since they sat down for dinner, nose buried in a book and ears suspiciously red.

He hasn’t moved an inch all night, even to escape the noise, which leaves him only a few feet away from the rest of them. Caduceus gets the feeling he’s about to regret that. “Oh, I’m sure there are those that have it worse,” he grins. “Right, Mr. Caleb?”

Caleb’s gaze snaps up over the edge of his book. “Ja,” he rushes out, strangled. “I mean - nein - of course I am not - I am just trying to read here-”

Jester doesn’t wait for him to dig his grave any deeper. “Oh my gosh, Cay-leb, are you super ticklish too?”

Caleb stuffs his book back into its holster and holds a hand out preventatively, reaching with panicked precision for a strip of leather tied just above his knee with the other. “No, I am not-”

“Oh, no you don’t.” Fjord rocks backward and reaches out with one broad hand, latching onto Caleb's wrist, and Caleb promptly abandons all spellcasting to kick at him like a startled rabbit.

Despite that, he reels Caleb in gently, scooping him into a neat little ball before he heaves him into the middle of their little circle and squarely on top of Caduceus. “I think we owe you a nice, long thank you for this lovely dome, don’t we?”

There’s a moment of silence as Caleb presumably thinks about how easy it would be to kill them all in this enclosed space. “This,” he says, as severely as he can with his feet in the air and hair in his eyes, “is the opposite of cuddling, and if you do not leave me alone then tomorrow night I am going to make all of you sleep in the rain.”

Even the seasoned homebody in Caduceus knows that’s the exact wrong thing to say to a group of damp and grumpy adventurers - if the mood in the dome was mischievous before, it takes a steep dive into outright evil.

Beau cracks her knuckles. “Yeah? Let’s see what you have to say when we tickle you again tomorrow.”

And if Caduceus laughs as Caleb gives one startled owlish blink and then scrambles to hide as much of himself behind Caduceus as possible - well, that’s not from the tickling at all.

#Tickling #critical role #caduceus clay #jester lavorre #the mighty nein #bc i cannot tag all seven of them that feels illegal #chocfic

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nightowlwriting · 3 years

Text

summary: caleb is not so sure that he deserves the kindness you've done for him. you're sure that he deserves so much more, and you plan to show him in small increments so that you don't scare him away. the shopping trip is only the beginning. (part 3/13 of the kindness series, a thematically connected series of c2/exu imagines)

word count: 2.1k

warnings: caleb's low self-esteem, mentions of political corruption, set early in c2

note: i am only on ep16 of c2 so that's where we're at folks, also my german is so so so rusty so uhhh hope it's right but any germans want to correct me feel free lmfao

masterlist - request - support my work? - ao3

Caleb Widogast is a jumpy, jumpy man. You assume it’s for good reason - he’d confided in the group that he met Nott in jail and, well, typically people don’t go to jail unless they’ve done something.

(Although, the more that you adventure with the Mighty Nein you’re not so sure that’s true. It seems like corruption runs deep in the Empire, and you’ve only scratched the surface.)

Still, he is far jumpier than even Nott, and she’s a goblin in the Empire. You watch him, sometimes, and cringe when he flinches. It’s not pity that makes you start being nice to Caleb, but that does color your actions in the beginning. You are of the firm belief that he is a good person, that all of the Nein are, and that they deserve kindness. Caleb most of all. He is so hard on himself and no amount of coaxing from the rest of the group can get him to ease up. Not even Nott, and she functions as his pseudo-mother. But you want him to loosen up, want more of those moments where he makes a joke with a straight face, only to crack a small smile when the group looks away from him. (You try not to look away, craving those moments where you can see the smile light up his face.) When your group arrives in Zadash, you make it your mission to get Caleb to feel some sort of positive emotions about himself.

Or some sort of positive emotion that’s not scarred by whatever happened in his past. You want him to be happy, to heal from whatever keeps him held back from joking with the rest of you. It doesn’t even matter if he reciprocates how you feel about him - you don’t really care. You can love him from afar, be kind to him, and that will be enough for you. He doesn’t have to fall in love with you like you’ve fallen in love with him, really, that’s not why you’re doing this. This being stopping by Pumat’s shop to pick up some more spell scrolls for him with your gold. He had been muttering to himself the last time you were all in about not having enough money, but you hadn't wanted to embarrass him by purchasing them on his behalf, so a separate trip it is. Pumats, all of them, seem to know what you’re doing because they smile when you tuck the scrolls under your cloak and sweep out of the shop.

Your next stop is an ink shop, where you pick up some more ink and incense for Caleb. You’re not really sure how his magic works because it’s not something he was born with or given by a God, but you know that he’s always looking for good ink, parchment, and incense. Just because you don’t understand doesn’t mean that you can’t be supportive. You hope that’s what Caleb will get out of your gift, and not anything else. After you gather the magic supplies - you’d asked specifically for the things that wizards use just to make sure - you make your way to the Chastity’s Nook. Maybe Caleb was joking about wanting to be titillated while he learns, but you feel better safe than sorry.

The worker there is incredibly nice, if not shy, and helps you pick out something educational, historical, and terribly smutty. It makes you blush when you glance through it, but it seems to be the right balance of the things that Caleb has expressed interest in before. (Even if that might be fake - you’re not totally sure. Still, it can not hurt to try.) She even wraps it up nicely for you, offering to wrap your other gifts too. That might be too much, so you decline, but you still pass her a few more silver as a tip. You’ve never been so nervous as you are when you make your way back to the tavern where you’re staying, but it’s almost easy to keep your cool and mask the absolute terror you feel when Caleb is sitting with the group, eating dinner. You were kind of counting on him being in his room, reading, but you don’t let his sudden appearance stop you. Jester spots you first, patting the empty seat between her and Nott, calling your name. You slip into it, easily concealing your gifts behind your back. “Where did you go?”

A sly smile slips onto your face as you reach forward, taking a portion of the food they’d ordered, “Oh, you know, around.”

“You smell like perfume,” Beau leans over Nott and sniffs you, making a slightly disgusted face, “Why do you smell like perfume?”

“I went shopping,” You cut in before Jester and Molly can interject with salacious theories, “That shopping happened to be in the Tri-Spire, thank you very much.” Caleb raises an eyebrow, sharing a look with Fjord, but you ignore it. “What did you guys do today?” You don’t really listen - only enough to hum or nod as they’re speaking - because you’re focused on figuring out a plan to get your gifts to Caleb without the others noticing or making him feel like you’re doing it out of pity, or that he owes you. You just want him to be happy that he’s getting a gift. It’s later, when everyone has cleared out, that Jester shakes your shoulder lightly, calling your name.

“Are you okay?” Her dark blue eyebrows pull down over her eyes, incredibly worried, “You didn’t talk at all during dinner.” You take her hand in yours, squeezing it briefly.

“I’m fine, Jessie. I think I might head to bed, though.” You give her a hug before heading up to your room, looking over your shoulder just before you hit the stairs to see if Caleb had gone to bed when you had zoned out. He’s easy to find in the corner, nose deep in a book, and you grin. That makes everything so much easier, especially since Nott is tucked into the booth next to him. That means that their room is completely empty and a perfect place to drop the gifts without any of the unnecessary baggage that might come with giving them to him face to face. You don’t even think about the fact that he might have warded his room until it’s too late. (That being until you watch the string snap around your ankles when you make it four steps into the room.)

But, damnit, you have a mission to complete. There’s at least a minute before Caleb makes it to the stairs and perhaps another half a minute before he hits the door. You set the things up on what you think is Caleb’s bed a little messier than you wanted but you’re running out of time. The door is a no-go to leave, and you can hear Caleb bounding up the steps. You whirl, tugging your cloak tightly around you as you debate jumping through the window instead of opening it. In the end that will just draw an entirely different reaction than you want, so you settle for slamming the window up and slinging one leg over the sill. Caleb’s room is on the second floor, so the fall might hurt a little bit, but Caleb is right outside the door, so you don’t have any other choices-

“Was machst du in meinem Zimmer!?” He bellows, hands already engulfed in flame, when he kicks the door open. It startles you off of the window sill, luckily into the room instead of out. You pop up, hands raised and already talking.

“Okay, I don’t know what you’re saying but I didn’t know you had your room warded, I was just trying to give you the things that I bought you today, and then by the time I realized it was too late because I couldn’t just leave without giving you the stuff, because then you’d be scared-” Caleb extinguishes the flames that had started to crawl up his arms, shutting the door as he comes closer to the bed. You scramble to your feet, snagging your cloak in your hands to twist it nervously. “-I should leave now, excuse me.” You do your best to skirt around him but Caleb holds up a hand, eyes on the pile of loot you’ve left on his bed. He wraps a warm hand around your wrist to keep you in place as he tries to process what’s happening.

“What is on my bed?” Caleb finally looks toward you then, eyebrows furrowed as he watches you nervously fidget with your robe, biting your lower lip. “I am not mad, but what do you mean things you bought me?” He gestures loosely with the other hand and you take a step closer to him and the bed. You weren’t ready for being confronted with Caleb, despite how much you thought about what you might say to him in a situation like this. You almost swallow your tongue trying to figure out what to say to him.

“I bought you things,” You blurt, “Because you deserve it. I’m not sure if it’s all the right things, but I tried and even if you can’t use them for, you know, magic things you can use them for other stuff-” You watch as he makes his way over to the pile and begins rifling through it, mumbling to himself in Zemnian. “I’m not doing this out of pity, or anything,” You move to his side, peeking over as he skims through the book you bought, “I did it because I want to, I promise.” You wring your hands and look off to the side, avoiding watching the way he’s pouring over what you’ve bought, “You weren’t even really supposed to know they’re from me, honestly, I just wanted to do something nice for you because you deserve kindness-”

“-I am not so sure about that,” Caleb turns to you, catching your attention. He smiles, but it’s weak, when he looks at the small pile you’ve bought for him, “The spells will be useful for the group, but the rest… You are too kind.”

“I’m not!” Perhaps on instinct, you reach out and clasp his wrists in your hands, “No, Caleb, please. I didn’t do this to make you feel bad, I want you to feel good. You’re so bright, Caleb, and so amazing that I just want you to feel a fraction of the happiness you make me feel.” He hesitates so you press on, taking the chance to step closer to him as your heart takes off at a breakneck pace in your chest. “Please, don’t feel guilty. I did this because I want to, okay? I want to make you happy and make you smile, and make you feel good because it makes me feel good. You don’t have to do - to do anything and if you want, I’ll stop. You just say the word and I’ll stop, but I see you, Caleb.” Your voice breaks off as your eyes mist over. He looks awe-inspired at you, not stepping away or pulling from your grasp, “I see you. I see the way you bite back jokes, and sometimes they slip through. I see the way you care for us, for Nott. I see the way you sacrifice yourself in everything you do because you don’t feel like you deserve to be happy, but you do. Please, you are such a good man - I can see it. I can feel it, Caleb. You deserve the world’s largest kindness, but if I can’t give that to you I’ll give you small kindnesses, if you’ll let me.” Your lip quivers and your voice comes out in a hoarse whisper when you decide to fling yourself off the metaphorical cliff you’ve found yourself on, “Caleb Widogast, I wish to give you never-ending small kindnesses not only because you deserve them, but because I love you. I am in love with you.” The difference sits heavy in the air between you as you watch Caleb process everything that you’ve said.

“You… Are you in love with me?”

“Undoubtedly.” You confirmed, whispering. He’s stepped toward you a fraction of an inch, but it puts the both of you nearly chest to chest. “I have never been so sure of something, Caleb.”

“I enjoy the way you say my name.” He confesses. You watch in wonder as red begins to crest from underneath his facial hair, coloring his cheeks a rosy, pretty pink. He tries to look away, but you duck your head to try and keep some semblance of eye contact. Your hands tremble in his.

“I’ll say it forever, then,” You try to smile, but you really only manage an upward quiver of your lips, “Every day, if you’ll accept my kindness.”

“Es wird schwer,” Caleb says under his breath as he shuffles even closer to you, “Es wird so schwer, aber ich werde es versuchen.” You’re not totally sure what he’s saying, but when he presses a terrified, hesitant kiss against your lips the message comes across loud and clear.

#critical role imagine #c2 imagine #cr imagine #caleb widogast imagine #caleb imagine #caleb widogast x reader #caleb x reader #caleb widogast / reader #caleb / reader #campaign 2 imagine #critfic

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sapphicquill · 3 years

Note

congrats on 100 followers friend <3 may I ask for anything with ler!Fjord bc the way you wrote teasing in your TAZ fic was so good? or lee!Lucretia during the Stolen Century arc being tickled out of her antisocial little shell if you're in a TAZ mood :) -Chock

Whoops. This is what happens when my whole life gets flipped upside down and I have to move cross-country back home out of no where! Sorry for the long wait, I'm finally making headway on these fics. I owe the entirety of this fic to @ticklishnonsense's honey-tongued because that’s the Ultimate Teasey Ler!Fjord fic and to @poesparakeet-fics for the plot because my smol brain could not come up with anything good and she gave me THE GOODS. Hope you enjoy, @chockfullofsecrets!

(ao3 link!)

Rating: Teen

Characters: Fjord, Caleb Widogast

Wordcount: 2423

After everything they’ve all been through, Fjord thinks he can handle most things. Spitting up salt water in the mornings, nearly getting impaled by strangers on a regular basis, Nott rifling through his shit—while he’d rather not deal with all of that bullshit, he can and that’s the important thing.

But the crushing weight of all the damn pining happening between Caleb and Essek might be the one thing Fjord absolutely cannot handle for any longer.

It had started innocently enough. Hands brushing and secret smiles and eyes briefly meeting before diverting, full of nerves and excitement and swirling butterflies. He’d experienced some of the same with Jester, but the two wizards were starting to get insufferable. It was painfully obvious to anyone in the room that they had a thing for one another, and even if it wasn’t, Fjord had overheard Caleb whining to Jester more than once about the entire situation, so it wasn’t like he was entirely oblivious to his own crush.

But apparently perpetually sad and stuffy wizards are really bad at just admitting what was right in front of their faces. Fjord’s worried that one of them might just explode soon, and that’s the entirely altruistic reasoning that finally inspires him to insert himself into the situation.

Caleb’s problem, Fjord thinks, is one of confidence. He gets too caught up in his own keen mind, tangling everything up in his head and overthinking and overanalyzing and panicking and deconstructing until everything’s just a jumbled mess of knots. He just needs a little push is all. A little something to nudge him past the trouble that is thinking and into acting. And Fjord thinks he knows a fairly good method of encouragement.

Thus, Fjord is currently standing in the doorway of the mansion library, trying not to reveal his presence too early. Caleb is folded over a desk with a pinched expression on his face that Fjord knows by now means he’s reached some sort of roadblock in whatever he was working on. In other words: a perfect time for an interruption.

“Productive afternoon?”

It’s a testament to how close the group has gotten that Caleb only sort-of flinches at the sudden sound of Fjord’s voice.

“Ah, nein, not really,” the wizard replies as he straightens up. His back makes an ominous cracking noise as he sits up and Fjord winces in sympathy.

“Gods, then maybe it’s time to take a break, hm?”

“Ja, a break…” Caleb trails off, eyes drifting back to the scattered parchment and books on the desk. Fjord resists the temptation to roll his eyes at the utterly predictability of their headstrong wizard.

“Okay, well now I’m making you take a break, Widogast,” he says as he marches swiftly over to Caleb and practically hauls him out of his chair. Caleb, unsurprisingly, goes willingly, letting himself be shuffled over to a nearby sofa.

With a huff, Caleb sits and begins massaging his temples, willing away either a physical ache or a swirling mass of snarled thoughts and ideas. Fjord lowers himself down next to the human and pretends like he isn’t thrilled over what he’s about to do.

A comfortable silence descends then. After a few more vigorous rubs, Caleb leans his head back against the leather of the sofa and closes his eyes and Fjord figures this is the best chance to spring the trap.

Quick as a slash of his falchion, Fjord twists from his spot next to Caleb and pulls him down into a horizontal position before caging the human in from above. He hovers over the now-prone wizard and tries not to feel too smug as Caleb yelps but doesn’t move an inch to try to wiggle away.

“Scheiße, what the hell are you doing?”

“I’ve actually been meaning to talk to you about something,” Fjord says casually as he can. Caleb gives him an exasperated look, complete with raised eyebrow and suspicious frown.

“And this ‘something’ requires you to pin me to a sofa?”

Fjord grins before scooping both of Caleb’s wrists up with one hand and pulling them above his head. Exasperation shifts quickly into a mix of disbelief, fear, and anticipation and Fjord is lucky that around his friends, Caleb wears his emotions very clearly on his face.

“Well,” the warlock starts, “I kind of figured that this particular topic would send you scampering off if I didn’t take some preventative measures.”

A fiery blush colors Caleb’s cheeks and Fjord tries not to laugh.

“And something tells me I thought correctly.”

Caleb makes a noise not unlike one Fjord’s heard from Frumpkin and finally starts to struggle lightly in his grasp, like his body is only now catching up with the rest of him. Fjord lets him, figuring that letting the wizard work himself into a bit of a tizzy will just make his own task easier. Caleb’s terribly predictable. As the human squirms minutely under him, Fjord lets his free hand curve subtly into a claw and hovers it just next to Caleb’s lower ribs.

“Now, see, I also think you might benefit from a little preemptive encouragement, because you’re the most stubborn fucker I’ve ever met when you have to talk about anything personal...”

Fjord trails off when he notices that Caleb’s eyes have locked onto his hand, mostly because he knows that the brilliant mage has connected all of the appropriate dots and will voice a protest in three, two—

“N-nein, Fjord, wait just a moment, there is no need for—”

Fjord slowly flutters his fingers, still poised a hair’s breadth from the stretched expanse of Caleb’s ribs, and Caleb cuts himself off with a hitched laugh-gasp, eyes wide as saucers.

“I don’t think you’re in any position to negotiate right now,” Fjord says, the edges of his voice tinged with a low growl as he keeps the motion of his fingers going. Caleb doesn’t really do much aside from grow ever so slightly redder in the face.

Without further preamble, Fjord finally moves his hand to meet Caleb’s torso. It’s like the wizard has been hit with a successful Thunderwave—his whole body jolts before tensing up so tightly he trembles. Continuing the fluttering from before, Fjord traces across the space between Caleb’s two lowest ribs and grins when Caleb lets out something between a giggle and a whine.

“Gods, you’re so easy to rile up, you know that?”

Caleb’s giggling picks up at Fjord’s words. He’d have pity on the wizard if it wasn’t so adorable. Still gently teasing at the softness of Caleb’s lower ribs, the half-orc leans forward until his mouth is right next to his victim’s ear.

“You’re just that ticklish, huh?”

Caleb thrashes, throwing his head from side to side so rapidly Fjord would be worried the human would hurt himself if he hadn’t watched this happen numerous times before. For good measure, he lets his fingers drift up Caleb’s ribs and lets out a small laugh himself as the giggles morph into airy, full-blown laughter. Exactly as planned.

“So you and Essek,” Fjord says casually as he straightens back up, pitching his voice a little louder to be heard over Caleb’s bubbly laughter. The wizard definitely seems to register his words if the cut-off gasp and even more desperate wiggles are any indication. Fjord laughs a little to himself at the adorable way Caleb scrunches his nose when the increased movement does little to deter his attack. Taking a little pity, Fjord pushes on, his free fingers swirling tight circles up and down Caleb’s right side.

“You know he likes you too, right?”

Fjord’s not exactly sure humans are supposed to turn that shade of red, but Jester’s got healing spells to spare right now, so he continues.

“And as amusing as it is watching you two dance around each other, it’s getting a bit old.”

“B-bitte, Fjord—!”

Caleb’s own laughter cuts off whatever plea was going to escape next. The wizard flops his head a bit side to side, like if he shakes enough he’ll clear Fjord’s words like trapped water from his ears. It’s downright precious and one hundred percent ineffective.

Adjusting his grip on Caleb’s wrists, Fjord lets his fingers trail up his captive’s ribs in the same slow pace he knows will drive Caleb up the damn wall. It’s a little impressive, actually, how easily this light tickling can take their resident wizard apart. Particularly useful at certain times. He can feel Caleb trembling under him, laughs high and desperate as the light tracing fingertips slowly migrate up to what both Jester and Molly affectionately refer to as his worst “death spots.”

“So, here’s my idea.”

His fingers flutter just below the space where his holsters normally are—fortunate Caleb feels comfortable and safe enough to remove them when at the house—and the wizard groans through his laughter.

“Either you promise that you’ll confess to Essek the next time he’s around, or I’ll just have to keep tickling you forever. How’s that sound?”

“Wh-aaat? Bitte, no, that is e-eehviil!”

“That’s kind of the point, bud,” Fjord replies around another laugh of his own. He floats his fingers up the scant few millimeters to the space between Caleb’s uppermost ribs without prompting and hopes that the wail the human lets out doesn’t worry the rest of the Nein. (It shouldn’t, not with the frequency Caleb makes noises like that.)

“I’m not letting up until you tell me the first words out of your mouth when you see Essek next are ‘Can we talk somewhere privately, Shadowhand?’” Fjord pitches his voice into a terrifically awful imitation of a Zemnian accent that has Caleb laughing, somehow, even harder. Though, on second thought, that might have more to do with the rapid little scribbles he’s got focused on the space above Caleb’s top rib than his attempt at accentwork.

Unsurprisingly, Caleb doesn’t say anything much in response, instead throwing all of his effort into laughing and squirming ineffectively. Fjord keeps a careful ear out for any hint of the safeword Jester had insisted everyone know about and respect upon pain of near-death, but the only thing coming out of Caleb is whimpered begging and a spray of foreign curses. Perfect.

Fjord takes a split second to send a silent apology to Jester, who will no doubt be massively upset she missed out on assisting Fjord with this bit of encouragement, but this was his game right now, dammit, and it was time to go for the kill.

(Would it be worth the inevitable tickling the blue tiefling would dish out later? Most definitely.)

“Alright, well, suit yourself, Widogast.”

With that, Fjord moves the tickling to Caleb’s exposed underarm and focuses the entirety of his attention on making the human melt.

With an impressive amount of core strength, Caleb attempts to jackknife in half to throw Fjord off. Fortunately, their wizard’s tricks are well known by now. Fjord barely budges as he keeps up the spidering under Caleb’s arm, letting his fingers trail just the slightest bit up the underside of Caleb’s bicep before reversing back down to the soft spot just above Caleb’s uppermost rib.

The fight drains out of the mage just as quickly as it revved up, leaving him loose and floppy and lost in the throws of his own cackling. Fjord would feel bad if he didn’t know how much Caleb was enjoying himself. Time to step things up a notch.

“You know how to get me to stop, Caleb. Do you really like the thought of me tickling you like this more than the idea of confessing to a crush you know is damn-well mutual? Really seems like it.”

More wailing, more thrashing, but still, no dice. Maybe a slightly different approach…

“Gods above, you’re just too ticklish for your own good, aren’t you?”

As always, Caleb responds viscerally to the mere word and that, of all things, seems to be the final straw.

“Scheiße, bitte! Habt mitleid! Ohhkay, I pr-promise!”

“You promise what?”

“Oh please, I caa-aan’t—!”

Fjord shifts from light tracing along Caleb’s top ribs to a solid press of his palm, steadying the human as his laughter slowly eases up. After a few gulps of air, Caleb continues.

“I will tell Essek how I truly feel when we next encounter him, I swear to you!”

“You’re absolutely promising me you’ll spill about your deep, undying love for Essek Thelyss the very moment he’s within twenty yards of you?” Fjord taunts, curling his fingers back into a claw at Caleb’s right side. The human tenses and anticipatory giggles start bubbling from him almost instantly.

“Ja, ja, I a-ahh-m!”

“Good!” Fjord says brightly, pulling his hand away from Caleb’s squirming form. He smiles down at Caleb, who looks about ready to protest the large hand still pining his wrists to the sofa, before lowering himself to speak directly into the wizard’s ear.

“And maybe after you two have worked everything out, I’ll have a little chat with Essek myself about how much you like this particular method of torture.”

Caleb looks a bit like he’s swallowed a toad.

“F-fjord, mein Gott, wait—”

“I’m sure Molly and Jester would be more than happy to help me tell him all of the best ways to tickle you senseless, hmm? They’re tieflings, you know how honest they get when tickling comes up. They’ll just gush about how much you love it when we wreck you until you can’t remember your own name.”

He isn’t even tickling him anymore, but Caleb is giggling, light and bubbly and tortured, all from Fjord’s teasing alone.

“Hell, maybe we’ll all get you the next time Essek comes by the tower. How’d you like that, him watching you get tickled by every single one of us until you cry and knowing you love every minute of it?”

Caleb’s just babbling in Zemnian through his laughter, eyes squeezed shut and a grin pulling wide at his lips.

“D’you think he’d join in if we asked him to?”

Caleb just keeps laughing. Fjord grins. Mission successful.

#tk fic #tk fic community #tickle fic #critickle role #critickle role fic #cr tk fic #lee caleb #ler fjord #prompt fill #chockfullofsecrets #100 follower prompt celebration #finally filling these bad boys #big thanks to poe for actually motivating me to write this thank yooooou #sapphicquillfics

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thatonesadending · 3 years

Text

How Mollymauk met the Traveler, and learned Caleb's nickname for him

I am in the middle of writing a long another fan fic, but this scene that I am not yet at wouldnt leave me alone, so I had turn it into a oneshot and post it. Enjoy my shameless Widomuak story =) Spoilers for CR2 E136

___

All of the Mighty Nien sit around the table in Caleb’s tower, enjoying a good meal for the first time since Mollymauk had come back to them. Molly is resting his head playfully on Yasha’s shoulder, feet crossed and resting on the table, and occasionally stuffing one of the many pastries on the table into his mouth, and enjoying the animated retellings of his friends adventures.

“Oh! Oh! Molly, you have to meet Artie!” Jester excitedly yells at him, as she twists around to cox what looks to be a small red weasel out of her hood. She held out the weasel to him and exclaimed, “Say hello!”

Before Molly could say anything though, an unnaturally deep voice greets him, “Hello. I must say, it is quite wonderful to have you back Mollymauk, Jester has told me quite a bit about you. Well, rather, painted quite a bit about you.” Somehow Molly could feel the creature's eyes rake over him, taking him in from head to toe.

“Why do I feel like he is undressing me with his eyes?” He staged whispered to Yasha, earning him a light laugh. “He can be a little - ah, mischievous.” She replied.

The weasel was settling back on to Jester’s shoulder again, and Molly swore he winked at him. “I am always appreciative of beautiful things, especially the ones that Jester draws for me.” he said.

Jester was full on cackling now, and trying half-heartily get the animal to stop talking. Molly was about to ask how Artie could speak, when Caleb interrupted, not even looking up from the book that he was pouring over while they ate. He had been very tired after the days battle, so Molly was surprised when he joined them all for dinner, multitasking between reading and correcting the Nein’s stories, and occasionally eating

“You are indeed a very pretty man, Kätzchen. But you should probably ask Jester to burn the painting she did of you in the bathhouse.” Caleb was smiling into his book, still not looking up.

“Hey! You all didnt believe me when I said that he had the best dick!” She protested at Caleb. Molly had to blink back the surprise of this revelation, but something else caught his attention.

“That’s new. What does it mean?” He asked. Caleb finally looked up at him, and Molly watched as the man was replying what he had last said to answer his question. “Kätzchen, never heard you call anyone that before.” He supplied.

Caleb flushed a bit, Molly found he really did enjoy making the wizard a bit red. “Ah, well - it means ‘kitten’.” It was his turn to blush, though he was a little confused on the choice of nickname, even though he knew Caleb really liked cats. “Because, ah - you can purr.” Caleb almost whispered the last bit, before standing and saying louder, “I am going to see if there are anymore of those Blueberry Lavender Muffins.” He was abrupt pushing away from the table and and dashing to the kitchen.

Molly felt his cheeks get even hotter. It was quite a bit to take in, being called pretty and given a personalize endearment by a man that didnt give his affection easily.

“Don’t be embarrassed Mols,” Fjord was reassuring from across the tables, “Jester can purr too.” He said it so casually, that when the other tiefling elbowed him, he yelped in surprise.

“Fjoooooord!” She admonished, and when he gave her a confused face, she continued, “I only, you know, purr a little, and only when -” She made several weird gesture with her hands, and then puckered her lips. Molly wasnt the only one blushing anymore, Fjord’s ears turning dark. “Oh, I didnt realize Jes.”

Beau, never one to be left out of a conversation, had to bring the attention back to Molly. Normally, he loved attention, but he was feeling a very particular embarrassment right now that he didnt really want on display.

“How does Caleb know you can purr Molly?” She was almost accusatory, like a big sister getting protective. Molly looked up at Yasha for help, but she seemed to be enjoying her friend feeling awkward. “Yeah, how?” was all she said, laughter behind all her words

“How the fuck should I know?” He managed to squeak out. He did know though, he just thought he had been more subtle and the other man hadn’t noticed. He had spent several weeks flirting with the wizard for fun, and the few times Caleb had actually let Molly cuddle close to him on the road, or sat near him on watch, Molly had let out a soft purr here or there. It was an unconscious thing, and he had always made sure to be quiet, thinking he wouldn't notice. Well, apparently Caleb had.

He knew by the heat on his face, they weren’t going to believe him, so he had to excuse himself before they poked more questions at him. “You know, those muffins were quite good, I think I’ll grab another too.” He was beginning to see how really subtle he was.

Molly just bearly caught Beau remarking to the others and he tried to get away, "I wonder if thats why he yelled 'You shouldn't have killed my cat' when he killed Lorenzo?"

Oh, Molly was gonna have to tease him about that.

#widomauk #mollymauk #mollymauk tealeaf #caleb widogast #critical role #Molly is fine #bring back my molly #I like the idea that Caleb thinks of Molly as his cat

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essektheylyss · 3 years

Note

How about a "wearing their lover’s clothes" one, though going out of intent here: mayhaps Essek wearing something of Caleb's because Essek's wardrobe is a little oh-so-conspicious? 👀

this turned into a bit of Fjord friendship but I could not imagine you would mind lol.

This bedroom of the building Fjord has rented for them all to lay low for a while is smaller even than the one he had occupied at the outpost, and a far cry from the cool, dim room of his own now-empty home, but the ocean breeze that meanders lazily through the open balcony doors makes the summer’s heat almost bearable, and the linen curtains that it catches on shade the room from the harshest of the morning sun.

“You should change,” comes the whisper at his back, as he peers through the curtain into the narrow side street below, as bare arms snake around his waist, and he leans back into Caleb’s chest, humming softly and letting his eyes close for a moment.

“Into what? I have nothing here besides what I had with me in Aeor, and none of it is suited for the Menagerie Coast.” He has already shed his fur-lined cloak and mantle, and Caleb fumbles with the clasp of his outer robe, leaving him only in his base layer, and he is reminded again of how different the Coast is from where he has just left, where even one layer of wool is too warm.

“Jester is already planning a shopping trip, but you cannot wear this.” He tugs at the thick sweater that Essek still has not shed. He has abandoned a lot today, and he is not excited to lay himself wholly bare here, a final rejection of everything he has just left.

While he retains the clothing he wore before their hasty and unannounced teleport out of the outpost, he can pretend like maybe if he cast a spell, he could return, that things would be the way they were, even though he knows it’s not true.

Caleb’s arms wrap tighter around him, and he shivers as lips press into his hair. He has to wonder how a part of him can even consider that the way things were was preferable to this.

He pulls the sweater over his head and drops it with the other lined, heavy clothes he has shed. “And what do you propose I wear instead?” he asks, crossing his arms over his now bare chest and turning to face Caleb, who raises an eyebrow.

“Well, I thought you may want to borrow something of mine.”

Essek slouches just a bit to stare up at him, emphasizing the sizable height difference between them. “I don’t think your clothes will fit.”

“My shirts will be a bit large, but they’ll be fine.”

“I can’t exactly forgo trousers.”

“No, I suppose not.” Caleb grins wickedly, and Essek momentarily considers kissing him to wipe the smirk off his face. “I bet I know someone who could alter a pair of pants, though.” He pulls a copper wire from his pocket and speaks into it. “Fjord, we could use some assistance, if you have sewing supplies somewhere in your tool kit easily accessible.”

Essek blinks. “Fjord?”

“Of course.” Caleb lets go of him and turns to the bed to rummage through his things, unceremoniously dumped there an hour earlier by Fjord himself as he had distributed the contents of their recently-retrieved bag of holding. “He says he’ll be right up.” He holds up some well-worn brown trousers, and offers them to Essek. “How about these?”

“Anything is fine.”

Caleb grins again at his resigned voice as a knock echoes on the door, and Fjord pokes his head inside. He raises an eyebrow as his eyes find Essek, taking a seat on a chest at the end of the bed, and Caleb, still sorting through clothing, both shirtless. “Can I help you? Tell me you have a favor to ask that will get me out of this shopping trip.”

Essek barks a laugh. “It is quite optimistic of you to think your girlfriend will allow that.”

“Essek has nothing to wear, so I thought I’d lend him something of mine, but he is of course, ah—“

“Short,” Essek offers, deadpan, and Fjord laughs this time.

“Well, you’ll have to put the pants on for me to fit them, but yes, I can make that happen.”

He sits on the edge of the bed and unfolds a small leather-wrapped sewing kit, setting pins on the nightstand as Essek awkwardly shuffles to Caleb, where he is at least somewhat out of Fjord’s view as he changes. The pants that Caleb offered are at least six inches too long, and a bit large in the waist, but admittedly less ill-fitted than he’d expected.

Fjord beckons him over and pins the hem, and Essek stands perfectly still for several minutes in silence. He is familiar with getting fitted for clothing, but he is not particularly comfortable when it’s a friend doing the fitting.

“This is the quick and dirty method, and you are, somehow, not nearly as disproportionately skinny as your boyfriend, so I’m not going to bother much with the waist,” he says. Essek flushes further at that, and Caleb coughs behind him. “It will be a bit of a shit job, but it’ll work well enough for an afternoon. If you are attached to this pair of pants for whatever reason, I can do it properly tomorrow, but Jester threatened to start baking if she does not get out of this building within an hour, and then the entire day will be lost.”

“Is there anything here to bake with?”

“Yeza and Veth already returned with their groceries, so I imagine she will go knocking for some flour soon enough.” Fjord pulls back. “Okay, you can take them off now.”

Glad of the warmth, Essek flushes and strips the pinned trousers carefully to avoid getting stabbed. He puts his own pants back on in the meantime, even with as hot as they are, and Fjord gets to work.

“Where did you learn to sew?” he asks, taking a seat on the bed and helping Caleb organize the pile there, keeping an eye on Fjord’s deft stitching.

“Fjord was a sailor,” Caleb pipes up, but Fjord shakes his head, barely glancing up.

“It was certainly a useful skill on a ship, kept me in the good graces of whatever crew I happened to be a part of, but I learned to sew at the orphanage. Otherwise I wasn’t going to have much in the way of clothes, as fast as I grew as a child.”

“Orphanage?” Essek blinks. “I don’t think I knew that.”

“No, I don’t believe you did.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s not something I speak of often. It’s not far from here, actually.” He speaks around a few pins in his mouth easily. “Caleb, these are very worn out. They’re going to need a patch on the knee soon enough.”

“Ah, yes, they are… they’re the first pair I stole after I escaped.”

Fjord raises an eye at the pair of them, landing on Essek, who fidgets again.

Caleb changes the subject by tossing a thin linen shirt to Essek. It buttons halfway down, without much in the way of a collar, and he pulls it over his head. Already it’s an improvement over the wool he has abandoned on the floor, and he stands to collect it and fold it and tuck it away in the chest, where he wonders if he will need it again. Already it feels like a shoddy disguise, a costume he put on trying to be someone.

Wearing Caleb’s clothes, it doesn’t feel like he has quite settled into someone else, but it’s a step closer to someone he wants to be, without all the constraints of the life he has shed.

What little he carries by way of possessions put away in the small closet, which Essek imagines they will later magick to accommodate a bit more space, Caleb settles beside him on the bed and fixes one button that has not been pulled all the way through.

“You look good in my clothes,” he comments softly, and Fjord makes a derisive retching sound in his throat without looking up.

“If you want my assistance, please wait until I have finished and left, thank you. I’ve third wheeled Beau and Yasha too many damn times—“

“Alright,” Caleb says, laughing. The heat of this city in midsummer is stupefying, and the shift in weather—in life, really—has been quite a lot for just one day. Essek rests his head in Caleb’s lap, fingers threading through his hair, and exhales.

“How long do you think that’ll take?” he asks, his voice already thick with sleep, and Fjord glances at him.

“Maybe another half an hour,” he says, and if he wants to make another teasing comment, he hides it well.

“Okay,” he yawns. He weaves his hands around Caleb’s shin, and lets his eyes close. They have time, of course. He can rest for a few minutes while Fjord completes this sewing, while Caleb combs through his hair, while the breeze from outside pulls the fear from him with every new breath. “Wake me then.”

#critical role #cr fic #shadowgast #essek thelyss #caleb widogast #fjord #fic prompts #freckledmccree #me: and all of them go hide in port damali and rent out a four unit building #and beau and yasha have a floor and caleb and essek have a floor and the lavorres (marion jester and fjord now adopted) have a floor and th #because everything's fine! it's totally fine!#they're just gonna go be cute roommates and hide in port damali and lay low for a while! everything's fine!#maybe they take a side quest to kill a snea snake #yanno lots of options because they are all completely fine #hahahahahaha it's great! we're doing well #anyway lmaooooo #also it's me so it doesn't need to be said but also this is sfw don't worry

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saphirered · 3 years

Text

Late Night Caleb Widogast x reader

*You got in the splash zone of a fireball and have a good post battle talk with the caster assuring him it’s not his fault you got hurt*

The fight was turning and not in your favour. Two away from the main fight. One down. You use your staff to swing at your opponent and deflect a blow from another with the other end. Behind you you saw Fjord looking between you and the unconscious wizard on the docks.

“Go! I’ll be fine!” You shouted swiping the legs out from under one of the crew members. Within a second Fjord teleported away and started making his way toward Caleb. You started going the same way too but on the gangplank you were met with the Captain herself. She came at you with her rapier and you just managed to avoid the first hit but the second one cut into your arm pretty deeply. You’ve had much worse though but with the ship behind you and Avantika in front you couldn’t really go anywhere. She kept attacking you but you managed to hold your ground landing some good hits yourself but the fight seemed far from over until a red light shot out from the far docks hitting the ship. The heat of a fireball burned at your side and you were flung off the gangplank barely making it onto the docks. Avantika seemed to be fine and just out of range but now you were far enough away from her. Grunting you got up, your entire left side of your body tingling, scorched red and bleeding. It wasn’t as bad as it could have been had you been at the centre like some of the unlucky crew members but it still hurt a good bit. You ignored the pain and as the Captain looked behind her to see you get up with a smirk and a wave taking a sprint as far as you could until you were stopped by guards. You held up your hands in surrender and just followed along with the others.

From your position you could see Caleb standing frozen in place eyes glazed over arm stretched out as the guards grabbed him. Though from what you could see, the wizards wouldn’t be in the right mind to cast spells any time soon. Everyone went along and you were begging the gods the plan worked out and Beau and Jester got the book to the Plank King.

——————————————————————————

Everything had worked out fine in the end… at least as well as to be expected and the Nein now had ownership of the Squalleater and were back on sea with their crew, all banished from Darktow. The sun set a few hours ago and you took watch as you felt like sleep would not come to you easily anyway. Jester and Caduceus had been able to heal your injuries but you still felt like you had taken a dive off a cliffside onto the rocks. You stand on the deck watching the sky, the sails blowing in the wind and into the vast darkness of the never ending sea, Darktow now far behind. Stuck in your own world you don’t hear Caleb getting onto the deck and pick a spot far away from you staring into nothingness. Deciding it’s time to try and get some sleep you get up but seeing the wizard sitting at bow of the ship looking at the partially scorched masts and deck fiddling with something between his fingers you decide against it after all. You walk over and sit down next to him. He doesn’t respond beyond the brief pause of his motions let you know he knows you are there.

“If you want me to leave you alone I can go.” You look at him expecting some sort of a response, words or not but you got none. Waiting a little bit longer you eventually get up. Half up a hand wrapped around your arm so you sit back down in a comfortable silence. You know, to an extend what he had been through and what happened in Darktow triggered some bad memories. Caleb would talk if he felt like talking so you’d wait patiently and you stay with him night and day if it means he’d utter even a single word. He’s suffering and sometimes someone just being there can make even the tiniest difference. At least, for you it had in the past. Hours pass and you gather from the sky you are but hours away from dawn though only Caleb can confirm your estimate more precisely. Your mind starts wandering again looking at the sky, the endless seas ahead but you are pull out of your thoughts by the wizard speaking.

“How?” Caleb breaks the silence. The word came out raspy and ridden with guilt and pain, eyes still trained on the scorched ship. “How can you still look me in the eye let alone sit next to me knowing what I did to you?” A pitied frown creeps onto your face as you tried to formulate an answer. You feel bad for him but that doesn’t change the way he’s feeling.

“Because it was never your intend. Because sometimes accidents happen. Caleb, you might be one of the most intelligent people I’ve ever met but you can’t know everything. You can’t control everything no matter how hard you try. You didn’t know I was there and to be honest, if you hadn’t cast that spell I’m sure I’d be dead right now with my head on a spike or weighed down by some rocks at the bottom of the sea.” You turned to face him. “I’m alive aren’t I? I’m still here and I’m still kicking. That’s what counts.” You softly put you hand on the side of his face and turned it away from looking at the fading burn marks now no more than a bad sunburn thanks to the clerics.

“I don’t want to lose anyone else. I don’t know why even the thought of losing you hurts so much. I can’t afford to lose someone else.” He’s conflicted. Caleb never truly cared about who lived or died. Sure he’s grown attached to the Mighty Nein but wouldn’t hesitate to run should it come to it. At least, that’s how it had been. He’s changing, experiencing things he hadn’t felt in a long while. A sense of belonging, friends maybe even family. He’s not alone anymore and while that comes with many perks, it also came with risks and downsides to the way of life he has grown so accustomed to.

“It hurts because you are a good man, Caleb. It shows you have a heart and care for those other than yourself.” You reach for his bandaged hand but don’t touch until he places his hand in yours. You give his hand a squeeze and guiding him slightly to the side so you can see his expression.

“I’m anything but a good man. The things I’ve done, I’ll never be a good man.” He looks down at your hands and you bit your lip. Despite his hunger for learning and broadening his mind he is stubborn and changing his mind is as difficult as getting Nott to give up alcohol.

“I’m only going to tell you this once so listen carefully.” You encompass the hand you’re holding and move to unwrap the bandage. To your surprise he doesn’t stop you and turns his arm to make it easier for you to do so. “You feel that pain? That guilt and regret and heartbreak tearing at your soul? Don’t wallow in it for it will not serve you well. You carry your mistakes and regrets with you and they will weigh you down like bricks. You use your bricks to build but your actions will determine whenever you are building a palace or a prison. Only you can make that decision but know you have the potential to create a better tomorrow for everyone.” You remove the bandages from his left arm and moved on to the right. Caleb keeps his focus on your hands as you work. While your hands may be weathered and show the years of labor and harsh circumstances your touch is soft, careful and deliberate like a porcelain painter, delicate and precise with fragile material.

“These scars? They are part of you but they are not all you are. You are so much more than your past, Caleb.” You trace the scars on his arms. His eyes focus on your every movement.

“You want revenge on those who wronged you and hurt you like they did and continue to do so many others and I swear, if that is what you desire, what you need I will help you do so but do not let it be your undoing. You use your guilt and anger and mistakes and you use them to drive you but do not forget your compassion, kindness and desire to right your wrongs and remember why you are on this path. You are not alone anymore. Empires rise and fall by the actions of one. Imagine what a bunch of assholes trying leave a place better than they found it can do to the world.” He finally looks you in the eye and you can see the turmoil trying to calculate and process what’s going through his mind. The Caleb always quick witted and charismatic seems to have problems finding words.

“Thank you… For everything.” He trails off. You start picking up the bandages to wrap his arms again. “No leave them… For now at least.” He traces over one of the more prominent scars.

“Only told you what you undoubtedly already knew but are just to stubborn to accept, you idiot.” He musters a smile at your comment and breathes in deeply.

“A bunch of assholes changing the world? I like the sound of that.”

#caleb-widogast-x-reader #critical role x reader #mighty nein x reader #caleb widogast x reader #caleb widogast

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peach-the-owl · 3 years

Note

I think I something you might going to like. 84 but with a twist. Reader is a sorcerer and a friend of Vox Machina, the last time they seen them was battle Mind Flayer thus sacrificed themselves to froze the gate to other dimensions and stop Mind Flayer. Only see Vox Machina one final look before froze themselves. Not until Mighty Nein broke the frozen sorcerer. Only hear familiar voices, once they open their eyes they realize it's not Vox Machina, but the group who saved them.

Kinda like Avatar The Last Airbender when Aang frozen in time. Hope this is too much for you.

Some friendships transcend lifetimes… I love The Last Airbender it’s such a good show, and I’ve defiantly watched it over a dozen times, but anyways onto the story

I know I’ve called stories long before but like I thing this one takes the cake so far… here’s hoping it’s a good one

Lost Time

Vox Machina/Mighty Nein & Sorcerer!Reader (Platonic)

84- Who are you?

Spells flew left and right as you and the rest of Vox Machina faced off against a rather troublesome Mind Flayer, your ultimate goal was to destroy the gateway this aberration had opened and stop any beasts from coming through from other dimensions. Having silver dragon blood running through your veins meant you specialized in ice magic, being able to freeze just about anything with enough time and effort put in. With the rest of the team keeping the Mind Flayer distracted while you tried to use your magic to freeze and shatter the gateway, but the problem was this gate was enormous. The Mind Flayer had caught on to what was happening and attacks you causing you to lose concentration on your task, thankfully you’d managed to deal enough damage to shatter the base of the gateway causing it to crumble to the ground, falling on the Mind Flayer effectively killing it. For a moment it looked like you’d won but as the dust settled some you see the portal was still open and extremely unstable, energy crackling every which way the cavern starting to collapse around you.

"We can’t stay here the whole place is coming down on top of us." Percy calls for a retreat.

"It didn’t close, we broke it but it didn’t close!" Grog shouts still in a rage. You look over at all of them then over at the portal, you knew what had to be done so with a shaky breath you start towards the broken gateway.

"(Y/n) what are you doing? We need to leave!" Vax calls for you with a panicked tone.

"If I don’t seal this thing, it could mean more trouble then even we could handle." You continue forward against the groups protests getting close enough in range to start using your magic to freeze the opening before anymore energy can release itself. The room grew drastically colder, frost appearing along the walls as you pushed yourself past your limits.

"We can’t just leave you here!" Pike cries.

"You have to, if you don’t you’ll be buried here as well!" You yell, urging them to go without you.

"But-"

"Just go!" You scream at them, by now you could feel the cold of your magic effecting your own body. With looks of sorrow you watch as they all make their way to the exit, Keyleth looks back and calls your name one more time before being dragged off by the others. "It'll be okay." You whisper to yourself, a single tear sliding down your cheek as the gateway lets loose a pulse of energy and you unleash all your magic at once to conceal it, making your vision go white…

Everything felt cold, shadows were moved around in front of you. Were you dead? You thought you might be but then you start hearing faint voices, albeit muffled hit your ears.

"… see that?" It kinda sounded like Vex but you don’t remember her having such a high pitched, bubbly voice.

"It… dangerous." That sounded like Keyleth except much deeper and gravely.

"Wait, I think… in there." Since when did Grog become so soft spoken and educated?

"Maybe… use fire… see what’s inside." You defiantly don’t remember Scanlan sounding so shrill before.

"… not a… perhaps… could be dead." Now when did Vax get such an odd accent?

"… they're alive. We need…" Percy also sounded much calmer and relaxed then you were used to. What was going on, and why did everyone sound so different? A glowing light shines through bringing a warm feeling with it, there’s a cracking sound followed by shattering as you fall to the ground, you figured Pike must’ve used some sorta healing or restoration spell to free you. After a slight pause you gasp in actual air for the first time in you weren’t sure how long, and look up at the people in front of you. Your vision was still a little blurry trying to adjust to your surroundings and for a brief moment you thought you were staring at your friends, but when you rub your eyes to clear them you see before you a group of complete strangers making you jump back in surprise.

"Who are you?" Your voice comes out chattering both from fear and from the cold that still lingered in your body.

"Could ask you the same question." The woman who looked to be a monk shoots back.

"Well I asked first." You rebuttal attempting to stand, your legs were still shaky causing you to trip only to be caught by the firbolg on one arm and the tiefling on the other.

"Hi! I’m Jester!" The tiefling says cheerfully, holding her hand out for you to shake.

"Uhh… pleasure to meet you." You greet slowly accepting the hand shake, you then look to your other side at the firbolg.

"Hi, I’m Caduceus, how are you?" He introduces himself.

"I’m doing quite alright, thank you." You then look to the others in the group.

"Hi I’m Nott, just Nott." The goblin gives an awkward little wave, you wave back.

"Name's Fjord." There was a minor shift in his voice that made him sound more western, but only for a moment. You just nod your head in acknowledgment.

"My name's Caleb Widogast." The red head says rather stiffly, you could easily tell he was a wizard due to the large spell book stripped to his persons.

"Beauregard." The monk woman simply says.

"It’s very nice to meet you all. My name's (y/n)." You finally introduce yourself, now feeling a little more comfortable around them. "You have my thanks for freeing me of my icy prison."

"How did you end up in there anyways?" Jester asks. You explain to them everything you could clearly recall from your adventure before somehow placing yourself into some kind of frozen stasis.

"You know, now that I’ve had a better look…" You trail off slightly, taking in your surroundings once more. "This looks nothing like the cavern I sealed myself in. Where exactly are we?"

"You're in the Happy Fun Ball!" Jester happily states, you give her a confused look.

"That’s only a nickname." Caleb quickly jumps in, giving you a quick explanation of the object you were inside.

"How strange, maybe the last pulse of energy from the gateway sent me here along with most of the ruins." You look over at the broken and thankfully inactive gate that was in shambles, defiantly no way to activate that thing anymore.

"So if I may ask, why go through the trouble of coming here a second time? I mean, you know how dangerous it was the first." You question.

"Well we're looking for someone, that wasn’t you, and hopefully find a way to stop this cult for something called the Angel of Irons." Fjord gave an explanation this time. You let out a large sigh, this was a lot of new information to take in such a short time.

"That’s interesting." You say absentmindedly, still taking in this new situation you were suddenly in. You shake your head a bit and look to the group. "Well, if you need any help I'll happily oblige, it’s the least I could do for freeing me."

"Why that’s very generous of you, honestly we could probably use all the help we can get." Caduceus gives you a kind smile.

"Of course, just tell me everything I need to know about your situation." With that they all started to explain everything that’s been happening, it being a little hard to follow along sometimes with them talking over each other but you get the picture eventually. "So your friend, Yasha right? She’s under this Obann's control and they also have a creature called the Laughing Hand at their disposal. Now your here looking for the wizard Yussa because he’s been missing in here for 3 weeks and time is really strange here too, did I get all that?" You question.

"That’s the basics of it." Nott says with nod.

"Looks like we got our work cut out for us. Especially with the strange time here." You place a finger under your chin in slight thought, you had a lot of questions running through your head but had to put them aside for now, there were more pressing matters to deal with first. Finally having regained enough strength to stand on your own you set off with this new group of adventurers…

Taking down the Permaheart had been no easy feat but with Beau downing it and yours and Caleb’s combined spells it was finally reduced to frozen ashes and you’d finally located Yussa, amongst other things that happened and were ready to leave this place once and for all. Throughout all this, as helpful as you were you could tell this group still didn’t fully trust you, whispering amongst each other and defiantly not telling you everything. Who were you to blame them though, they were as much of strangers to you as you were to them, even if they did save you, so you figured it best to just keep a slight distance when they talked quietly with each other, and if you were being honest you were exhausted. Having been frozen for who knows how long didn’t cancel out the effect of having used a lot of magic, plus the magic you used to help fight off the creatures and creations that lurked in this sphere. You located the exit and the second you all arrived inside of Yussa's tower you fell to your knees panting.

"Whoa, hey are you alright?" Fjord comes over to you and helps support your weight so you could still stand.

"Sorry, I’m just a little tired is all, I suppose after everything I still haven’t fully recovered from my icy sleep." As if to exaggerate your point you let out a yawn and start leaning your full weight into the half-orc.

"Do you think it would be alright if we left (y/n) here for the time being." Caleb asks Yussa who in turn looks over at your exhausted form.

"I juss need some proper rest, I’ll be out of yer hair and rejoin with them once I dooo." You slur through your words slightly.

"Very well." He says with a soft sigh, then turns to his assistant to get a room prepared for you. When your brought in you immediately collapse on the little makeshift bed and pass out, getting some much needed rest. You awaken feeling much more refreshed and walk your way up the tower to where you hoped to find Yussa, when you enter the room you see the mage as well as the Mighty Nein and a very familiar face who stared back at you with as much of a shocked look as your own.

"Allura?" You ask almost nervously, she looked much older then when you’d last seen her. You see her eyes gloss over a little as she holds back tears.

"(Y/n)?" There’s a slight silence that fills the room before the two of you embrace each other. "I was told you sacrificed yourself to save our everyone, we all thought you were dead!" Allura practically cries, breaking away from the formal appearance she’d put on in front of everyone until now.

"I thought I was as good as dead too, but these folks here saved me, pulled me out of my frozen tomb." You say gesturing towards the Nein.

"Wait wait wait, you two know each other?" Nott looks between the two of you confused.

"Of course we do, we're friends." You simply reply.

"You haven’t changed a bit." Allura says looking you over.

"And you…" You pause slightly. "You’ve certainly gotten wiser." Allura just gives you a look that says "yes, I know I’m old". After your little reunion you refocus your attention on the task at hand, collecting information on this Angel of Irons and learning that it was in fact the Chained Oblivion, Tharizdun. You listen intently to everything being said to get a better understanding of what was going on and the more you learned the more serious and dangerous the situation grew.

"I believe it best I return to Tal'Dorei and inform the council, will you be joining me?" Allura looks over to you for confirmation.

"As much as I’d love to go home, I promised these fine people I’d help them. It’s the least I could do for what they’ve done for me." You give your friend a smile, she returns it with a worried look then sighs and nods.

"Alright, just please be careful and don’t disappear again, I don’t know how I’d handle the knowledge of seeing you alive only to learn you’ve really died this time." She places a firm yet gently grip on your shoulders, you place your hands on top of hers and give them a reassuring squeeze.

"I can’t make any big promises here but I’ll do my best. Until then it may be best if you keep my status a secret to everyone, alright? You’ll even be the first person I visit once this is all over." You look her in the eyes and slowly release your grip, once again she nods as she slowly moves her hands back to her side and teleports out of the tower.

"Aww man, I wanted to know who was on this council she mentioned." Nott looks down disappointed.

"Me too." Jester pouts. "Unless you know!" The two of them give you expectant looks making you take a step away from them.

"I can’t say I’d know for sure, a lot is different now then what I remember." You hold up your hands in defence.

After getting everything sorted out, you left Yussa's tower thinking as long as you stay with this group you should be fine. Then they split up, the girls in one direction and the boys in the other which threw you for a loop but you were able to sort yourself out and enjoy a more casual rest of the day getting to better know some of the others. The following days weren’t as you’d expect however especially when you were shopping around a little shop know as the Invulnerable Vagrant, it was no Gilmore's Glorious Goods but it still nice and you had to admit the shopkeeper, Pumat, was a charming firbolg in his own right. What was really unexpected though was the surprise attack by the Inevitable End, dealing with them was tricky when they could phase through the floor but you managed to drive them off and check in on what was happening with Yasha. Your next stop was a visit with a sorta mafia? You were really starting to question the group's moral compass, sure you have done crazy things in the past too but the Nein seemed to find a way to make things even weirder, you decided to stay out of most of it when they told you the only way to get in was to share your blood. Meeting up the next day you made your way back to Pumat's shop, being both shocked a relieved when he decided to join and help the party on this fast approaching mission…

Never in your life had you thought that the steps to a cathedral of Pelor would feel so menacing and filled with unease and yet here you were. The battle was intense, rifts opening and bringing forth creatures of the abyss, Yasha and the Laughing Hand were proving to be tough opponents and everything seemed to be going downhill. With sights set on the mind-controlled barbarian you weighed your options, you couldnt be reckless with your spells seeing as Beau had fallen unconscious so an AoE spell might end up killing her, you settle for using a Ray of Frost spell seeing as your silver dragon blood made it stronger. It works, distracting Yasha away from Beau and giving Caduceus the opportunity to dispel the control over her and spare Beau from deaths grip. With that taken care of you switch your focus to an oddly familiar situation, going to close the rifts and stopping the creatures coming through, however this time it wasn’t a large gateway at least. You were very focused on your task you didn’t notice Obann escape to the deeper chambers of the cathedral until you heard one of the Nein call to you.

"Obann's escaping we need to move!" Caleb calls, you look back and forth between them and the creatures still coming through a few of the remaining rifts, Pumat was still dealing with the the creatures as well and by the looks of things, despite his word of reassurance, he was already having a difficult time.

"You go on ahead, I’ll stay back here and help fend these creatures off!" You call back.

"Are you-"

"Just go!" You shout at them feeling a strong sense of déjà vu. You shake off the feelings, this wasn’t going to end like last time. The Nein disappear after the devil and with Pumat to aid you the two of you worked to close the few rifts and finish off the remaining cultists and creatures. It had been a long and strenuous battle but you’d done it and you were still alive, you rest yourself against one of the supporting pillars to catch your breath. After a long pause that feels like hours had passed, you feel a feathery touch against your shoulder, looking over at Caduceus who uses a quick Cure Wounds on you, Fjord also makes his way over.

"We want to thank you for everything, we may not have managed as well as we had if not for you." Fjord thanks, handing you a healing potion.

"I suppose that makes us even then." You comment with a cheeky smile happily accepting the potion and putting it to use right away.

"You know, I feel we could really use someone like you on the team, if you’re interested that is." Caduceus offers.

"I appreciate the offer, and though in reality it has been a long time since my last adventure, it still feels like it was only a short time ago to me. I really miss home, and am in dire need for a break, but if you do ever require my assistance in the future I will happily lend my aid to you again. For now I just wish to go home and familiarize myself with the changes that've taken place." You decline the offer as politely as you can, he gives you a nod of understanding. With that you get up, bid them farewell and exit the cathedral, making your way towards an area that’s out of the way before getting to work on a Teleportation Circle, as you're setting it up you think back to your time with this crazy group of adventurers, and while it was short they still made you feel welcome in their own strange ways. In some ways they reminded you of your time with Vox Machina, perhaps that’s why you were able to work with them and come to form a trust with them as quickly as you did, who knew. You finish the last symbol for your spell and the portal opens to the familiar view from inside Allura's tower, it was time to go home so with a deep breath you step through the portal.

Bonus (2 for 1 story):

Reunion

"Are you alright? You're looking quite nervous." Allura asks with slight worry as you walk through the halls of Greyskull Keep.

"I haven’t been home in so long and so much has changed, I just don’t know what to expect or how they’ll react." You admit. She places a hand on your shoulder and gives you a reassuring smile.

"Trust me I don’t think they’ll be expecting this either." You walk up to a set of large double doors.

"And from everything you told me…" You trail off a bit.

"There’s more I missed, but I’m sure they’ll be more then happy to fill you in."

"Okay…" You take a breath and reach for the knob only to pause again. "Why don’t you go in first, and I’ll follow your lead." Allura just gives a soft chuckle and nod before opening the door and heading in. You step back and try to catch your breath wondering why you still felt so nervous. You had to wonder if this was even worth it, a lot had happened and changed since you’d been gone and there was a lingering doubt that your friends might not even care anymore.

"Come in and say hello." You hear Allura's voice muffled through the door. Moment of truth, you steel your nerves and make your way through the door. When you enter you have a look around the room seeing all eyes on you, at first their expressions were blank or shocked so you decide to lighten the mood and give a small smile.

"Hello everyone, it’s been awhile." You say in almost a whisper, already feeling the tears well up in your eyes. The next thing you know your tackled into a hug by a sobbing Keyleth.

"You’re not dead! You’re not dead!" Is all you hear her say through her sobbing. You now return the hug having been able to stabilize yourself and comfort the Archdruid.

"I missed you too Kiki. I’ve missed all of you." You release one arm from her seeing as she wasn't going to let go of you just yet, and feel a slight pressure rest on your shoulder once you do. Craning your neck over you see a raven perched itself on you, you raise your hand and give him a little scratch under his beak as he leans into the touch. You look to the others seeing Vex approach.

"My word darling, you haven’t aged a day since we last saw you. What’s your secret?" She tries to add some minor humour to the situation but you could tell she was holding back some tears, being just as overjoyed as Keyleth.

"Just freeze yourself for a good 20 years or so and it’ll shave off those wrinkles in no time." You lightly chuckle, using your free arm now to offer her a hug. She accepts giving a much shorter side hug to you while the others finally came to their senses and start bombarding you with questions. You do the best you can to answer all of them as well as properly greeting everyone again and exchanging welcoming hugs from them, being lifted off the ground when Grog brought you into an almost bone crushing grip. "As much as I missed you too, I’m still fragile." You wheeze at the goliath.

"Sorry, sorry. It's just been so long." He says, trying and failing to hold back his emotions.

"Right, which reminds me, you must have stories to tell me. I’d love to hear what you’ve all done over the years."

"Oh man, where do we begin? There’s so much to tell." Pike ponders aloud.

"How about we start with what happened after my… departure." You suggest, ready for the day to be filled with stories of their adventures and exploits.

#critical role #critical role & reader #vox machina #vox machina & reader #mighty nein #the mighty nein #mighty nein & reader #nothing romantic here

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loquaciousquark · 4 years

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Talks Machina Highlights - Critical Role C2E111 (Redux! Oct. 13, 2020)

Gooooood evening good evening good evening, all! I started the VOD late for this recap and somehow the first four or so minutes of the show have a Twitch audio copyright claim, so I am reduced to only reading Brian's lips when he asks if we're on the internet. Hilariously, Marisha's background room is a comfy-looking blue/gold fabric wall with a ceramic colorful abstract lamp and a yellow silk scarf over the lampshade, and Taliesin's is an industrial looking games room in grey and black with multiple monitors, overhead speakers, and mysterious metal fixtures behind him. What a treasure this group is, honestly.

Tonight's guests: Marisha Ray & Taliesin Jaffe, discussing episodes 110 and 111 again. I wildly speculate once more about what might have caused their absence: jury duty? Sam appearing on The Masked Singer? Something to do with the animated show? One day, we’ll know, one day... (One day this “copyrighted audio” section will come back from the wars, too. Ugh!) Finally! The audio comes back to reveal Brian discussing the endless reality of digital meetings and Marisha talking about (I think) her glare-reducing glasses she’s wearing. Welcome to the New Age (welcome to the New Age, to the New Age).

Announcements: Marisha suggests checking out Dimension20, another live tabletop gaming group, which premieres live on Wednesdays at 4pm (CollegeHumor).

Brian immediately wants to know how they feel about the revelation that Molly is alive. Taliesin’s personal reaction: he “knows some things” he can’t talk about and is aware of several possibilities that might be going on, but had a sneaking suspicion that there would not be a body for them to find. He says it’s almost all there for anyone to see in past material. Marisha’s personal reaction: she just wants to know how she’s doing with her theories, & was trying to block Tal’s face out deliberately as she was going off on her theories in the last episode. Taliesin says he thought her ideas were pretty good!

Cad has no clue what to think - it’s like listening to your friends talk about Buffy. Marisha thought it was a 50/50 Molly would still be there, but Beau had no idea. Not that it mattered, because as soon as Matt went through with it the reveal still blew their minds. Tal laid out his plans for the character with Matt during Campaign One (towards the end) after they all got their VM tattoos.

It is a “horrifying and gross” thing to dig up a body, and Beau was pretty reluctant to do it. Tal, as Cad: “Sometimes dead’s better.” The moral quandary of trying to speak with a dead friend was very different here than the frequent occasions they used the spell in C1.

Taliesin says his poker face is very bad, so it’s easier for him to over-react and let it all play out. The only other player he can see very easily from his place in their current setup is Travis, and because he knows Travis doesn’t watch TM, tweet, or participate in social media, he admits he thoroughly enjoyed watching Travis freak out at his freaking out. He says he only knew about 20% of what Matt described at the end of that episode. He was picking things to mug to increase Travis’s surprise. I love this so much.

Taliesin provided the table left leg shake; Travis provided table right. Ha!

Beau is really accepting her role in the Cobalt Soul. It’s good when “as a person, you feel like you can settle into your calling. Sometimes you can do more from the inside than fighting from the outside.” It’s a mirrored but opposite path of Keyleth from C1; Beau felt like she was too good for her duty, while Keyleth thought she wasn’t good enough.

Caduceus is not a big believer in jumping to conclusions. He does have an idea/notion of the “city of the undead” and thinks all this necrotic energy must come from somewhere, and wonders if this is the “capital of anti-death.” He’s willing to believe whatever he sees. This is one of the few things that trigger a bit of loathing and disgust in him. It was terrifying that the Wildmother didn’t know anything.

Beau is pretty confident in her Charlie Day impression laying-out-the-research last episode. She enjoyed taking the things that were known & extrapolating around them; this is a huge facet of Marisha’s own personality and she really enjoys it, so she built a character this time that would allow that kind of puzzle-solving. It’s also why she repeatedly notes when Beau journals, so she can avoid metagaming. Trent’s mention of Vess Durogna’s tomb raiding was completely circumstantial, and the only reason she’d made the connection to the Tombtakers was because she’d recently reviewed those notes for a separate unannounced project. Sometimes she tries to make connections and Matt is like, “It was...just descriptive. Just flavor. The curtains were red...” and she has to discard a paragraph of notes. She feels like it’s still something they have to do because of “look at what he does! Look! It’s totally valid!”

Cosplay of the Week: @kitsunstudios with a gorgeous Caduceus with a very intricate silk vest.

Caduceus’s takedown of Trent! One of my favorite moments in the entirety of C2. Taliesin felt Trent was an asshole; Caduceus felt sorry for him because of how dumb he thought he was. Caduceus’s response was "this is the dumbest man I’ve ever met in my life. He’s so dumb! Is nobody going to tell this guy how dumb he is? Oh, they’re all freaked out. Somebody needs to tell this guy he’s an idiot before somebody gets hurt.” (Marisha: “Before?”) Tal says it was the product of several years of therapy and many drunk conversations with Whitney Moore. It was from a genuine place of concern from Caduceus. “How are you allowed to have this much power and be that dumb?”

Brian loved how funny it was to watch everyone tiptoe around Trent and then Caduceus bulldoze through the end of the meal.

Taliesin: “Damage doesn’t make you interesting or better. It’s not what makes you good. Character isn’t found in damage. Just recovery.”

Brian & Marisha commiserate going through the stage where believing surviving something automatically made you a stronger person, better for the pain; instead it just meant you had to pick up the pieces after. Marisha talks about how strength through survival may be true for some people, but it shouldn’t be considered a necessity. Taliesin talks about how he used to think he had to be miserable to write. Brian talks about how believing he liked reading and writing miserable things only limited him for years.

Marisha feels it’s a C2 theme that almost all the PCs have someone trying to handwave or take credit for their accomplishments or explain their pain as being for their own good (Trent, Beau’s dad, Obann). She thinks it’s interesting to see all the various ways people try to take credit for your work/delegitimize you as a person. She loves that RPGs allow you to explore these odd moralities in interesting ways. The only way to fight it is to have a sense of your own self-worth, which is a problem a lot of the M9 started with.

Caduceus likes everyone, and really likes people who appear to need role models (Eodwulf). “With the right friends and the right bar and the right attitude, I think he’d be okay. Come over here where it’s so much better. That seems like an exhausting friendship that you have there.”

Marisha loves the mix of personalities in the M9; Veth, Cad, & Jester were all “we kind of like them!” after the dinner, and she immediately made eye contact with Travis and they both shook their heads. She knows Beau has to go along with it for Caleb’s sake for now, but she & Fjord are pretty sus of Trent’s proteges.

Beau is less concerned about Artagan’s relationship to Jester because “he showed his ass--she’s less worried about Jester now because a little of the magic is gone.” It’s a little like becoming an adult and realizing your parents are also just adults & human. Caduceus wasn’t suspicious of the Traveler for a long time until they got to the island. Aside: Taliesin loves the pantheon in D&D. “The notion of attempting to apply common Western conceptions of religion to a world where you have a pantheon of interventionist gods as baseline makes no sense to me. Everyone admits that every other god is there and doing shit; it has more in common with ancient Rome than anything else.” Now that he knows it was a con, he feels the wind had been taken out of it. He does have a sense that Jester’s gotten back together with an ex: “I hope that I’m really happy for you.” They’re both interested to see how Jester navigates the new relationship.

My internet goes out, of course. I panic for a second, thinking I’ve lost everything above, but all is well! Thanks, Form History Control addon!

Marisha loved punching Artagan, but regretting rolling so poorly. “I miss violence.” Dani lets us know it’s been about four episodes since the last battle.

There’s no way the Cobalt Reserve doesn’t have a single document on the Eyes of Nine. Beau believes “there are no real secrets” because people are just bad at not writing things down. For there to be no information at all seems really suspicious for her.

Fanart of the Week: @oddalchemist on twitter with some awesome Beau conspiracy red-thread boards overlaid a distant shadowy Molly walking away.

Caduceus feels a little guilty for really enjoying his time right now with the M9 and not wanting to go home. He’s starting to suspect that he’s going to go home very different than when he left. “He has the softest problems. I don’t know if I want to move back in with Mom & Dad.”

Beau is trying to get comfortable with the idea of being happy. Jester is probably Beau’s first real best friend & one of the first healthy female friendships she’s ever had. As long as she still has Jester in her life, she doesn’t care. For Yasha... “At the end of the day, Beau is a lonely person and has always been a lonely person. And I think you kinda reach this point where once you’re not lonely anymore, you can kind of come out of the fog and realize that was horrible! And terrifying! And is even more terrifying now that I know what I could have, and I don’t want to go back to that. At the end of the day Beau doesn’t want to be lonely anymore. There’s always been that flirtation with Yasha, but everyone had to figure their own shit out. And now it feels like it’s coming out a little bit of that haze, maybe this actually could be...” There are a lot of ways they complement each other & are good-different from each other. Marisha believes people can be attracted to more than person at once.

Caduceus doesn’t think nature turned against him on Rumblecusp, it was just a reality of nature being dangerous and violent. “He has a complex relationship with nature.” He doesn’t expect special treatment.

Thoughts on the mansion: “Man, it’s nice to be seen.” Marisha: “I don’t know how I ended up becoming the Scanlan of this campaign, but I’m living for it.” It felt like an echo of “I’m better for having known you.” They compare Marisha taking specific notes on the campaign to Liam taking specific notes on people’s favorite tapestries, comics, etc.

They talk about missing theme parks and daydream a park version of the mansion in CritRoleLand. It’s lovely.

Taliesin never expected Divine Intervention to work; he just wanted to roll some dice. He’s still processing what he saw/heard. They all agree it was very useful in the Vokodo fight.

Vilya! Marisha: “Ah! Ah! Ah!” As a player, Marisha was so deep in Beau’s eyes she didn’t pick up it was Vilya at first (especially since Matt really emphasized they should not be looking for C1 NPCs). Marisha’s brain melted. She bawled her eyes out on the ride home after that episode. Right after it ended, Laura told Marisha “Keyleth finally gets her happy ending,” and it makes Marisha emotional again since Keyleth’s story ended so bittersweetly. She talks about the very real feelings of “just wanting them to be happy, though!” She went back and listened to all her old Keyleth playlists. Everyone was teary after the episode. “Everyone has these 100% real memories of being these characters and having these good times.”

And that’s that for that! Thanks for your patience, all, and is it Thursday yet?

#critical role #critical role spoilers #talks machina #talks machina spoilers #long post for ts

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gaawachan · 3 years

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Critical Role 135 Discord Convo (Topic: Shipping?)

Some pre-convo context: This conversation meandered a bit so there's a lot of stuff that may turn up in other conversations later; it was really late and so a lot of things were only briefly touched on.

Me: You know... people are gonna freak out if LoB doesn't just cave and romance Essek at this point. If he wasn't planning on doing so then his roleplay during the past few episodes is gonna cause backlash, I think.

Sibling: I think he was on the fence and then Matt was like, "Okay, I have to push this because I currently have plans to make Astrid a victim of Trent and/or the big bad of Caleb's arc."

Me: Certainly feels that way, lol. Matt's definitely the one that's been doing the pushing post-boat scene.

Sibling: Pretty much-- Matt has kept Essek near Caleb for every moment that he can

Me: (Caleb did tell Essek to stay close, lol) But in the past couple of episodes Liam's gone back to reciprocating. If he isn't planning on shipping it, he shouldn't do that.

Sibling: Despite Lucien's eyes. Oh for sure. I think he is though. Why else would LoB post stuff like *examples of LoB's twitter activity*? He doesn't egg on Astrid/Caleb shippers lol

Me: That's true.

Sibling: Plus, Essek is purple.

Me: Of course we weren't in the fandom when Vaxmore happened and then dropped, so we don't know if Liam did the same thing with that ship.

Sibling: God I hope not... C'mon, give us a bit of beeg yoshi

Me: Having watched half of season 1, I can say that there was way, waaaaaaaay less tension and such between Vax and Gilmore. Vax liked Shaun a lot, and Shaun was in love with Vax... but they had nothing in common, they didn't have any real theme/plot/setting/interest ties or anything. Just a vanilla relationship, like, they went out on lunch dates.

Sibling: It's funny because OTHER non-shippers came onto that ship-positive trend and started talking about Vaxmore and how more "real" it was. And I'm like, I feel like slow-burn romances are far more "real" than people hopping on each other as soon as that they get a chance (COUGH COUGH BEAUYASHA I'M SORRY COUGH). Don't disparage lunch dates, btw; there's nothing gayer than that.

Me: No, don’t get me wrong, I was actually about to post that "I can see why people like that because it feels realistic" The bigger problem with Vaxmore was simply that they didn't see Gilmore very often. I think Liam would have been more interested in continuing that ship if Gilmore had not been... well, the Pumat Sol of the campaign. Just not very relevant. This isn't the case for Essek; he is THE npc of this campaign, basically. He's more involved than any other NPC in either season. Side note: if C1 and C2 had happened concurrently, I'd have totally shipped Gilmore with Mollymauk.

Sibling: OH TOTALLY

Me: Lol

Sibling: Essek and Caleb have many interests in common, and Liam has CANONIZED Caleb's attraction to him, both intellectually and physically. They have expressed a desire to spend time together, platonically? to improve their craft. They have worked to improve with each other, speak with each other in a way that they don't with others-- not even people they're supposedly closer to. Essek has had a turn of his morals BECAUSE of Caleb's actions... What do other ships in this season have? Caleb and Astrid; they have shared misery and a past that stains ALL of their interactions. Maybe there is love left, but it would need a TON of work, and she is never onscreen long enough for that to be established. There's not really any tension aside from the viewers' "is this a villain" tension. Not even the dance felt good, it was transactional and there to hide information being exchanged and then they LEFT. Caleb and Eodwulf; Caleb said his forearms were hot, lol? But Eodwulf has even less time than Astrid, and hasn't even really piqued the rest of the cast's interest, in spite of Caleb's history with him. Caleb and Jester; Might have worked if JESTER WAS EVER INTERESTED IN HIM. AND SHE NEVER WAS AND STILL ISN'T. She was smitten with Fjord the moment she started projecting him onto Tusk Love lol. Caleb and Nott; I'm not touching this one Non-Caleb ships are like: Fjord and Jester; Sweet, predictable, pretty much how I pictured it being when it became canon. Jester being exactly the same and Fjord being openly affectionate. Maybe some priorities being changed around. Beau and Yasha; I'm NGL, I feel like they're together... because they're lesbians? And not because they actually have much in common aside from that? It's sweet, but if we're speaking purely from a like... chemistry standpoint? This one falls on its face. But, no, I'm sorry. Just because Caleb isn't literally devouring Essek's face whenever he's on screen (though he slobbers like he wants to whenever Essek uses Dunamancy), doesn't mean that the ship is "invisible". It's invisible to people who are only used to overt ships I guess But I'm sorry, I need to go back through and make a "Caleb slobbers over Essek doing magic" compilation. Because it doesn't exist yet, and yet it happens all the time lol And people are like "where attraction" RIGHT THERE, GUYS

Me: Speaking of Jester, actually. Jester's funny because early on she actually did tease/flirt with Caleb quite a bit... but then she stopped doing it. When? I'd say it happened right around the same time Caleb started having feelings for her, imo, after their waltz, when he said Astrid's name. Jester and Fjord were caged together in the Sour Nest and I think that, followed by the Fjord/Avantika arc, really sealed the deal for where her interests went. Also, Jester and Nott wrote that letter to Astrid, so by that point I think it's pretty safe to say that Jester not only was not interested in Caleb; she wasn't even interested in teasing/lightly flirting with him anymore. Also Caleb eyescrews Essek a lot... so yeah what are these people smoking? Even LoB, who has been wishy washy about the ship, has been pretty upfront about Caleb's interest in Essek.

Sibling: I don't think Widojest people want Caleb to be with someone happy and who makes him happy. Essek is not a happy man but Caleb's mood certainly seems to brighten whenever he shows up.

Me: I mean, there IS chemistry between Caleb and Jester but the issue is that the two characters view each other completely differently. She just doesn't see him that way. The other half of the equation is that Caleb tends to treat Jester as being more than just the cutesy trickster and a lot of the other cast members haven't really shown that? They tend to undermine her a lot actually. It's most obvious with respect to the Traveler. Caleb actually respects her relationship with Artagan. Other members of the group just hate him and have made it clear to her that they feel that way. That includes BOTH Fjord and Beau. Like if you compare the conversations she had with Fjord and with Caleb on Rumblecusp, it's night and day, but it doesn't matter because she just doesn't view Caleb as a prospective partner at all. She tends to frame their relationship in the same way several of the characters in the party frame their dynamics with Caleb. "I want to help him but I have no idea what the fuck to say or do." She'd still above average compared to the group at doing so but that's because of her mother's influence, not because she has feelings for him. Ngl, if I WERE to ship Caleb with someone other than Essek at this point I think I would pick Jester just because they have a mutual respect for each other. Oh oh here's an example. Okay, so Caleb's room for Jester in the tower right? It's very similar to her childhood room, but he deliberately "adults" it up, because he respects her as an adult. What was Fjord's gift to her in Rexxentrum? A child's toy. A unicorn statue. And that's cute and all, but... uh...

Sibling: A little infantilizing?

Me: Yes exactly, and it's the same way he behaves about her relationship with Artagan. One could easily argue that Fjord treats Jester sort of like she's the pixie girl stereotype, but that's just surface-level stuff about Jester. You'll notice that Fjord and Jester's conversations tend to lean cutesy and immature, but when Jester talks with Caleb, it's very often a thoughtful and deeper conversation, so I DO see why people ship it.

Sibling: I mean, but that's my problem with it. Maybe it's better than Fjorjester, but Liam doesn't lick his lips every single time Jester breathes too hard.

Me: Lol. Personally I think that part of the problem is that 1) Travis isn't comfortable with doing romance, and Fjord is awkward af, and 2) Jester/Laura has tried to get him to talk with Jester on a deeper level and it hasn't really been successful, and she's let some opportunities slip by, but Liam rarely passes up the opportunity to have a deeper conversation with other players, so he ends up having more serious conversations with Jester simply because Liam seeks out those conversations.

Sibling: Well Liam loves character romances. It's why his second character left as many options open to him as possible lol. It's the stark difference between Liam and Travis. Travis is only comfortable romancing his wife fictionally lol. Liam loves the way you can reexamine a character and reshape their ending with those choices and I think he's way more willing to just go "screw it, my character is horny AF for this wizard boy, what are you going to do Matt?" "my character is also horny for my party member, but it's probably unrequited, but I'm going to stick with it for character depth"

Me: Seriously though go back and rewatch the Rumblecusp conversations Jester had with Fjord and with Caleb. You could SEE it in Jester. Fjord was NOT saying anything she wanted or needed to hear. I thought she actually looked pretty hurt.

Sibling: Oh, I remember being like "well that was deflating" and it's why she kept asking people. She's looking for answers, and pretty much everyone pussyfooted around it becawuse she's such a cuwuty.

Me: Yes, props to Caleb for stepping up, even though he didn't give her the answer she wanted either. That's precisely the problem with her dynamics with other characters. They're too busy fawning over how cute she is and trying to shield her to get to anything much deeper.

Sibling: Whereas Caleb thought of her as a woman- someone he really liked, from... like super early on.

Me: Oddly the end result is that the non-stop shielding of Jester has inhibited Laura's ability to grow Jester as a character. Which has to be frustrating as a player.

Sibling: I think it probably has been. Especially because I think she wanted to explore how being in a romance would change her. She even hinted to that way earlier: "That's not at all how love is depicted in the books we read..." "You mean the porn books we read?"

Me: The character is rarely challenged and hasn't really been forced to change. She has changed in that she's matured from experience, but it's subtle and it isn't really acknowledged much. Nothing screamed this more than the climax of Traveler-con, where she was staring down the barrel of a monumental life-change and her cutesyness somehow convinced the planetar to be like... "fine, bye." Even MATT regretted that decision in the Talks afterward.

Sibling: Oh for sure! She just gets everything and you know what sucks? I think LAURA wanted Artagan to be taken. It would have devastated Jester but it would have forced her to change.

Me: Well actually, Laura said that she was going to offer to worship the Moonweaver instead of the Traveler if it meant she'd spare him punishment. When she said that, Matt's whole face just dropped; he was so upset that he wasted that opportunity, but that's the cost of treating Jester like she needs coddling. It's like... bro... she ax murders people... come on.

Sibling: She burns people to death with sacred flame and gets people lost in the woods by messing with road signs.

Me: She's been tortured and barely shows the trauma of it at all (can't believe that went unaddressed btw)... She can handle pushback... Like again, Caleb. Early on she butted heads with Caleb because she's a spoiled rich kid, but you'll notice that after offending him like that? She never did it again.

Sibling: Because she's a good person capable of introspection and changing her behavior to help people.

Me: It's a small thing but Jester actually became a better person precisely because Caleb didn't handle her with kid gloves.

Sibling: That even ties back to her dropping her flirting when "Astrid" was brought up.

Me: Yep

Sibling: ... Shadowgast is still better.

Me: Yep. I don't hate widojest and I think that of all the jester pairings it's probably the best, but of all the Caleb pairings Shadowgast is best.

Sibling: I mean, Shadowgast is best even by virtue of like... who else would you pair Essek with that he could still stick around the party for? He's only interested in Caleb lol. That's not to say he doesn't LIKE the rest of the cast, but back to the deep conversations thing...

Me: I've seen some people shipping Widojessek, lol.

Sibling: There's really only one person (and one group chat) where he had those sorts of opening up moments. Poor Fjord- just got a GF and people are already cucking him.

Me: Lol. Oh, man... Caleb and Essek really need to talk about the assembly. Specifically Caleb's past and what Essek's dealings with them were like in more detail.

Sibling: Matt tried to lol and Caleb was like "yeah okay i got plans, but also paper"

Me: Essek needs to be more direct because Caleb doesn't WANT to talk about it.

Sibling: He can't, he's a wizard. No melee attacks, emotionally or verbally.

Me: Well, the issue is that Essek prods at Caleb's goals, which are nebulous (so Caleb really can't give a satisfactory answer, and he also can't answer without talking about his past first). And when he prods about Caleb's past, he's too indirect. He needs to directly ask about Caleb's past FIRST if he wants more information about Caleb's goals.

Sibling: The next time they're in the tower (which I fear won't be for a while) Essek literally needs to be like "I'm drowning in guilt, you need to tell me about what I was involved with so I can manage it" He'd probably give him a few crumbs lmao. If Essek makes it about himself, Caleb is less likely to close up.

Me: Yes, that is exactly how Essek needs to frame it. "I don't have a full understanding of the nature of the people I gave power to. I know now that they're more terrible than I thought, but not exactly how. I think that in order to fully grasp what I have done, I need to know more about them." It's pretty blatant bait but Caleb would probably be convinced by it anyway.

Sibling: Oh for sure. Caleb can't exactly run away from that either; he's too chicken to flee from conversations. He freezes and either spills or clams up.

Me: At this point, there's really no GOOD reason to NOT tell Essek about his past. There's nothing to lose from it, and a decent amount to gain; it could turn Essek actively hostile towards the Assembly rather than keeping him cowering in Eiselcross.

Sibling: He's uncomfortable with it (trauma will do that) Doesn't want to get sidetracked (Essek told him not to) Haven't had a good time to do so (no privacy) Doesn't want Essek to distance himself from him (most likely)

Me: This is true, but he's already told the people who he least wanted to tell (Jester and Caduceus) ... Actually, my suspicion is...

Sibling: And neither of them pulled away from him-- eh? Me: ... that Caleb doesn't want to tell Essek because he's worried that Essek will, well... uh, treat him like a child. Caleb was so young, and telling the story of his past also means admitting that he's 11 years younger than he appears. And there is some amount of Caleb's view of his past that is irrational and he chafes viciously whenever someone tries to downplay his culpability by pointing out his age at the time.

Sibling: I think he already has. Don't try to tell me about how not patronizing that "Young Man" line was lol. It was meant in good faith but... I think Caleb does the abuse victim "the idea of ever being young and vulnerable again is terrifying" thing pretty convincingly. It's also sort of a rewind back to his respect for someone who seems outwardly childish, but is an adult whose choices need to be respected.

Me: There is another matter which... Well, Caleb is slowly coming to terms with his status as a victim (veeery slowly) but I think if Essek were to learn about his past, and taking into account their different cultural perspectives on age, Essek might have a hard time not reacting more in line with Beau/Nott's initial reactions to the full tale. Beau said she thought it was nothing to be ashamed of (and Caleb started laughing hysterically) and then Nott just full-on denied that any of it was his fault (which is completely at odds with his own belief), and since Essek's gut reaction to hearing the story is probably going to be something like "Trent is a baby torturer" ... That's not an easy thing for Caleb to stomach.

Sibling: And yes, Essek will absolutely have that reaction because at that age humans are still fetuses to him.

Me: This brings me to my final point. Caleb may be worried that Essek learning all of this and thinking that way will damage Essek's ability to see Caleb as his mirror. He may view it as a threat to the life-line he threw Essek that night in Nicodranas.

Sibling: And then it's not about bettering each other... It's about Essek being alone again and Caleb being alone.

Me: However, Essek's insistence that he is sure nothing Caleb has done could compare to what Essek has done does mitigate that risk significantly. It's just a matter of whether or not Caleb can see that and Essek can be pushy enough to get him to crack.

Sibling: I know Essek has it in him. He can forsake his country's precious artifacts to an opposing nation, he can push his BF to open up to him about his problems. Caleb, on the other hand, has been exceedingly fragile... since you know... GOING BACK TO THE ASYLUM, so I don't know if he's in a state to have that discussion, but if they don't have it soon, by the time Essek talks to him again Trent will probably be dead.

Me: Caleb is pretty blatant about his compartmentalization and deflection. He feels it's necessary in the current circumstance with the Tomb Takers, but somebody really needs to step up after Lucien's taken out and talk to Caleb about this stuff. Essek would be ideal because Caleb could benefit the most from Essek's perspective, I think, but really... anyone other than Veth is better than nothing. Going back to the Asylum was very obviously a severe triggering event and NO ONE TALKED ABOUT IT. Like, jfc, guys, Beau is right. She asked if Caleb was even capable of working alongside Trent, and Caleb said yes (if he thought it was necessary), but we all, WE ALL know that he can't. Not after that disaster.

Sibling: Especially because both Veth and Jester saw him go straight into "OH GOD WE'RE GOING TO DIE, HE'S HERE AND WE'RE GOING TO DIE, I'M GOING TO KILL HIM BEFORE HE HURTS ANYONE" and they were like "he can probably handle this"

Me: He was already borderline in that headspace BEFORE Trent showed up.

Sibling: And then afterward, he went straight into a dangerous self-destructive spiral. Like... I know we've said this before but thank GOD for that failed persuasion check.

Me: That nat 1 was poetry on so many levels. On a meta level the sheer luck of it was a delight, but within the context of the story I think it was great that Essek is just like... "No. I am not crossing this line, not even for you."

Sibling: It worked narratively, meta-narratively, and saved Matt from having to draw up a bunch of ambush situations made by Volstruckers when Trent inevitably backstabbed them.

Me: Can you imagine poor Matt trying to play the Tomb Takers, Trent, Astrid, Wulf, and Essek... AND Charlie/Devexien?

Sibling: He already forgets to play Essek, and he only had a few NPCs to deal with.

Me: Even purely from a gameplay standpoint, can you imagine all the loot they Nein would lose in Aeor if they had brought scourgers with them? What if they found that dunamis machine?

Sibling: EXACTLY.

Convo ended here, but I had some more thoughts. It was just too late to keep talking. For example, I like FjordxJester and BeauxYasha. I think they are actually complicated relationships but they just haven't really had the room to be deeply explored/examined, for example. I also did not go into nearly as much detail about my thoughts on VaxxShaun as I would have liked to mostly because that ship wasn't the point of the discussion. ... oh god how do I even tag this?

#critical role #critrole #critical role spoilers #critrole spoilers #caleb widogast #essek thelyss #shadowgast #jester lavorre

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lexa-lives-in-us · 3 years

Note

!!!!!!

May I request a Marion/Dairon snippet of what their future might look like in the undercover au?

The small celebrations turn into a fully fledged party. There is food, and music, and Dairon makes sure to keep an eye on Veth and Yasha for the first hour, because they keep tinkering with the shirt cannon until they are quite sure it's not fit to only throw t-shirts anymore.

But Caleb lures Veth away with the promise of good cocktails, and Yasha is easily distracted when Beau starts to drunkenly dance in the middle of the room.

The kids drink a bit more than what Dairon feels is necessary, and they suddenly feel very old and very boring.

They know they would've done the same at their age, and they also know that, as intoxicated as they are, these kids would probably be able to successfully go out and rob a bank and disappear into the night if it was needed.

So they sit back on the couch and try not to worry.

They sip at their drink, a concoction of something that Caduceus has put together almost casually, and she begins to feel the slight buzz of the alcohol. They're not drunk, not as much as the kids are, but they are positively and happily tipsy.

Marion collapses on the couch next to them, her own drink nearly finished in one hand and a darker shade of red on her cheeks.

Dairon leans back, rolling their neck on the back of the couch, before smiling softly at her.

"Are you happy, my darling?" Marion asks, husky and just slightly slurred.

Dairon chuckles, feeling lighter and more carefree than she's felt in a really long time.

"I am." they murmur, and Marion places her own empty glass on the ground before reaching for them.

Long fingers clasp Dairon's jaw, and Marion's tongue slowly licks Dairon's lips before the woman decides to kiss her.

Dairon melts against the couch, maneuvering themselves to also get rid of their glass and use their free hand to cup Marion's neck.

They make out, a bit sloppily, and Marion grabs their tongue between her teeth and sucks slowly on it until Dairon's hips slightly jerk forward.

An imperceptible movement for everyone else in the room except for Marion.

"Take me to bed." she commands, voice low and dripping with want.

Dairon could not say no if they were sober, and there is absolutely nothing more that they could want right now.

They barely throw a glance to the rest of the room, but Caleb and Caduceus are passed out in their beds, Fjord and Jester are curled up on their own bed and Beau and Yasha are still pressed against one another, slowly dancing at the rhythm of the new song.

No one is going to even notice they're gone.

Dairon gets up, pulling Marion with them, and they barely make it to the room before Marion's hands are digging beyond the hem of Dairon's pants.

They barely manage to close and lock the door behind them before Marion falls to her knees, dragging Dairon's clothing with her.

They barely notice the soft, steady pumping of the music coming from the other room, as Dairon finally pushes Marion onto the mattress and drives themselves into her, fingers curling and searching, their mouths locked in a searing kiss.

***

Veth leaves first, and they wave goodbye to her, Jester and Fjord as they all drive to the airport.

Witnessing Marion hug Jester and hold her closer to her chest, tears threatening to escape, is something Dairon never thought they would want to see.

Marion traces her daughter's face as she stares at her with loving intensity, almost like she's trying to commit it all to memory.

"You be careful, my sweet Sapphire." she tells her, and Jester closes her eyes and leans against her mother's touch.

"You, too, Mama." she says, and if anyone other than Dairon notices her voice shaking, they don't say a word. "I love you. Be happy, yes?"

It's a powerful, charged question, and it almost surprises Dairon when both Marion and Jester turn to glance briefly at them, before Marion whispers "I will."

Dairon feels like they're intruding, but Jester gives her mother one last squeeze before she approaches Dairon to hug them as well.

"Be careful and be happy." Jester repeats, and Dairon closes their eyes for a brief moment, allowing themselves to hold Jester's close for a long moment.

"I will do my best to protect her, Jester." they promise in a whisper, and they feel Jester smile against their shoulder.

"I know, Dairon. I'm not worried at all." she says, and she sounds incredibly sincere.

They watch them go, and only after the car has disappeared past the treeline Marion reaches for Dairon and lets herself cry.

The Nein watch her with dark expressions on their faces.

Dairon holds their lover with their heart breaking in two, and when they catch the somber expression on Beau's face, it shatters even more.

"It never gets any easier." Beau mutters, pulling Yasha against her side to squeeze her closer.

"It never will." Caleb echoes. "Let's get back inside."

***

It takes another day for them to clean up and close the safe house, picking up the equipment they can't leave behind and making sure everything else is undetectable.

Dairon and Marion help however they can, mainly observing the expert movements of these kids who are way too used to uprooting their lives to move them around the globe.

By the time nighttime hits, Beau comes back from driving Caduceus and Caleb to the airport, and then it's just the four of them.

They eat dinner in silence, finishing up all the leftovers Caduceus has saved up for them, and they don't stick around long afterwards.

In the darkness of what has been their room for the past few weeks, Marion places her head on Dairon's chest.

"A lot is going to change."

Dairon frowns.

"A lot has already changed, love." they mutter. "This feels like an avalance that we can't seem to stop."

Marion is quiet for a long moment.

"We'll be fine." she says, and it's determined.

Dairon decides to believe her.

***

They settle in Paris, and it's weird to go back to the same city where they have almost all died.

Dairon settles in Beauregard's safe house, a medium size two-bedroom apartment with a balcony facing the Eiffel Tower.

They raise an eyebrow at Beau and Beau blushes slightly.

"Yasha wanted a place with a view, how could I say no?"

"Whipped." Dairon grins, but before Beau can say anything back, Marion interjects from where she's taken a seat on the queen size bed.

"This bed is too small."

Dairon reply without even thinking about it: "We'll get a bigger one."

To which both Beau and Marion respond with a grin.

Beau backs away from the room to go and find Yasha, miming the sound of a whip hitting target.

***

Life in Paris is surprisingly easy.

As it turns out, Parisians don't really want to interact with tourists, or foreigners in general, and Dairon is more than happy to keep it that way.

They move around the city by foot, and start working with one of Marion's physiotherapists to get their arm back in tip-top shape.

After that, they sign up to a local gym, take personal training lessons to get back into shape and then rent out the studio for their own training classes.

They build their contacts back from scratch, using some of Beau's resources, some of Marion's and some of their own old ones.

Dairon lays low and doesn't make friends.

Not outside the Chateau, at least.

Inside of it, on the other hand, everyone learns who they are, or at least what is essential to know.

Dairon is Marion's lover. They are not a famous companion, they are not a VIP, they are not a well paying client. They are the person who gets to ask for Marion at any moment of the day and they get to know every single one of Marion's movement.

Marion Lavorre is very adamant of the fact that Dairon is to be allowed to handle the place as if they were Marion herself, and after Dairon slams one of the door security guards and lifts them against the wall with their good hand on the first week for trying to make fun of them and their relationship with Ms. Lavorre, nobody dares saying or doing anything ever.

Dairon and Bluud, the security guard, actually end up becoming pretty good friends, to a point where he invites them over to the Chateau gym to spar with him and the others on the security team.

Dairon learns every nook and corner of the Chateau, and they stop by at least once a day to either greet Marion with a good morning kiss, bid her goodnight with an evening one, or simply have a meal break with her.

Sometimes, Marion would drag them down with her eyes still half closed with sleep. She would kiss them with closed lips, always very self conscious about her morning breath, and she would snuggle closer to Dairon's chest until they both doze off to sleep.

Sometimes, Marion would wait for them at the end of the day with a bottle of fine wine and freshly baked goods from the kitchen and they would chat, sitting on the outdoor chairs on the balcony, telling each other about their days.

"Does it ever bother you, what I do?" Marion asks, almost every day for the first few weeks.

"No, it truly doesn't." Dairon responds in honesty. "I trust you, and I know you enjoy what you do. You love it, and I love you."

It comes easier and easier, to say those few words.

Marion always smiles and doesn't respond, kissing them instead.

Sometimes, Dairon would come back to their own place after a long day of sneaking around to find Marion already sitting on their bed, with her long hair draped around her shoulders and a pair of jeans and a shirt that would remind Dairon of different times.

Dairon would then press her against the mattress and claim her as theirs, kissing every inch of Marion's body to make her shiver.

"My darling." Marion would whisper, body arched in pleasure, nails scraping the back of Dairon's head clutched between her thighs. "My Dairon."

Sometimes, Dairon would drop on the mattress face first, and Marion would be the one taking care of them in the way Dairon would mostly need on the day.

"I was made for loving you." Marion tells them on the day of their sixth month anniversary.

Dairon's breath catches in their throat.

"You're a dangerous woman, Marion Lavorre." Dairon responds. "You make me want to do dangerous things."

Marion giggles, hand caressing the top of Dairon's head, looking absolutely stunning above them, naked body barely illuminated by the moonlight coming through the open window.

Sometimes, they would talk about their jobs.

"What do you want to do?" Marion would ask regularly, and Dairon updates her on their progresses, on what they built and what they discovered.

They both keep in touch with the Nein, and Dairon secretly picks up Jester at the airport to then show up at the Chateau's doors with her in tow, surprising the hell out of Marion.

Dairon receives a similar visit from Beauregard as they walk to their usual table at the Chateau's restaurant, finding their adopted-like daughter sitting comfortably with Yasha at her side and Marion grinning like a madwoman in front of them.

They are leisure and business visits at the same time, because shop talk is inevitable when they're all spies, but Marion never seems to mind.

They are all making good way with their leads on the Angels of Iron, and Dairon and Marion are constantly reassured that Marion is still safe since the Gentleman has left town and found refuge in Turkey, and Dairon sighs in relief every time Beau confirms no one seems to suspect they're actually still alive.

"We still don't have enough information to close in on them." Beau tells them one time, on a rare occasion where Jester, Fjord, Beau and Yasha all manage to find themselves in Paris at the same time.

Dairon nods, and Marion simply waves for another bottle of wine.

"Soon, my darling child." Marion promises, and Beau smiles gently at her. Dairon knows the kid way too well to not notice the way Beau's shoulder seem to lose a bit of tension every time Marion acts to motherly towards her.

Dairon wraps their arm around Marion's waist as they wave goodbye at the four kids from their balcony at the Chateau.

Beau and Yasha walk hand in hand in the middle of the Parisian street, followed by a dancing Jester and a laughing Fjord.

"Did you ever think we were going to adopt all of them, one day?" Dairon half-jokes, and Marion giggles, hiding her face in Dairon's neck. When she's not wearing heels, she's much shorter than them.

"Never." she admits. "Not that I mind."

"Having seven unhinged young-adults to look after?"

The moon reflects in Marion's eyes when she turns to look at them.

"Being a parent with you." she says, bluntly, honestly, and Dairon's jaw drops.

"Flies don't make a good snack, darling." Marion chuckles, placing two fingers under Dairon's chin to force their mouth closed. Once it does, she presses a quick kiss to their lips.

"Are you implying...?"

Marion shrugs, snuggling closer and looking out towards a half asleep Paris.

It's been almost thirteen months, and yet Dairon doesn't think they could ever get used to that view.

"I'm not implying anything." Marion murmurs. "I'm just putting ideas into the universe for the future. I have no interest in bearing a child, my darling, nor, I assume, do you."

Marion shrugs, her hand lazily caressing Dairon's chest.

"We lead dangerous lives. That much is true. We are far from being safe, and even once the A of I are out of the picture I doubt you would just... Retire from the scene."

Dairon thinks about it for a brief moment, then nods.

"I don't think I ever wanted to, no." they confirm.

Marion hums, like she wasn't expecting anything different.

"Precisely. No, I'm not talking about a baby." Dairon feels her smiling against her shoulder. "Maybe a teen. Someone we can help and rescue. Someone who just needs a roof, a family, and who should not grow out of the system."

Dairon's shoulders tense. The wording feels way too specific.

"Who told you?" they murmur, without any real anger behind their words. Only the usual, instinctual response of a past that will never stop haunting them.

"Fjord." Marion admits freely. "He also grew out of the system, and he mentioned you might as well. He is pretty good at picking up these things, I must say. My daughter is lucky to have him."

Dairon swallows, feeling their throat very dry, all of a sudden.

"Not even Beauregard knows, I don't think." they murmur after a while.

"I would never tell her." Marion promises, and Dairon believes her.

"I never really thought I would be a parent." Dairon whispers, eyes fixated on the horizon. If they focus hard enough, they might be able to spot the minuscule dots that are Beauregard and Yasha walking away.

"And yet..."

"And yet, that obnoxious child has plummeted in my life when I least expected it." Dairon grunts, making Marion laugh.

"Darling Beau is not obnoxious, Dairon." she pokes at them. "She is much more similar to you than you would ever like to admit, so if anything, she's just as obnoxious as you."

Dairon scoffs, but they can't hide the laugh behind it.

"You are impossible."

Marion hums in agreement.

For the longest time, silence hangs comfortably between them.

The gentle breeze envelopes them, and Marion's evening dress floats gently with it. Marion hides her face in Dairon's neck and Dairon presses a kiss on the top of her head.

Finally, a smile tugs at their lips.

"A teenager will be a lot of work." they murmur. "But I think we'll handle it."

Marion's breath itches, and the woman presses her face against Dairon's skin.

"Oh, my love..."

#cobalt ruby #spy au #undercover au #eheh #critical role art #marion lavorre #dairon #dairon x marion #beau x dairon #beauyasha

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